


Coming Home

by ThereIsLaughter



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Black paladin Shiro, Blade of Marmora Keith (Voltron), Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Eventual Romance, Friends With Benefits, Idiots in Love, Lance (Voltron)-centric, Langst, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Non-Graphic Violence, Not My Shiro, Post-Season/Series 04, Pre-Season/Series 05, Red Paladin Lance (Voltron), Shiro (Voltron) is a Mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2018-07-20
Packaged: 2019-04-03 21:58:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 78,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14005689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThereIsLaughter/pseuds/ThereIsLaughter
Summary: Keith was so cute.Lance wished that he could’ve stayed awake for hours, just watching Keith, listening to the little purrs and moans that he let out while he was sleeping but those noises only seemed to lullaby Lance into his own state of relaxation, and only a few minutes later, he felt his vision begin to blur as he too entered the realm of the sleepers with Keith.





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Set between Seasons 4 and 5. 
> 
> Just a little story I decided to write in my spare time for the last couple of weeks to break up from all the university work that is honestly about to bring me to tears any minute now.
> 
> Not edited because sorry, I'm lazy but there's probably not that many mistakes? Hopefully?
> 
> Comments are appreciated but honestly if you just read the story and enjoy it, that's more than enough for me. I'll add more tags as the story progresses because it's 1am right now and I'm too tired to keep thinking.

_A violet aura lights up around him. He is alone. Or is he? He stands in a room of white, a single bed with made sheets sits in the corner. It’s his room, but it doesn’t feel like his. This room hasn’t been slept in for weeks._

_A figure in front of him. Smaller. Thicker… Blurred?_

_“-So where does that leave me? Leave us?” He asks. He begs. His vision has blurred because tears are running down his face. He’s embarrassed but even still he can’t stop._

_The figure turns away, they stand front to back but there is so much distance. Why are they so distant? This feels wrong. Come back. Come back!_

_“There is no us.”_

\----

“-Lance, Lance!” A voice shouted through the void, pulling Lance from his thoughts until he found himself stood on the bridge. A very angry child dressed in green in front of him, glaring up at his dazed face. “Where’s your head?”

As a moment passed, Lance’s mind returned to him and he realised the angry child was actually his fellow paladin, Pidge, but it seemed as the seconds were passing she was getting more angry as she stared at him.

“You’ve even more spaced than usual!” Pidge growled in irritation. “What’s going on with you lately?”

Lance raised a hand and swiped the back of his neck, a habit he’d adopted lately when he was uncomfortable or embarrassed. “Sorry, Pidge. What were you saying?”

Lance looked around his surroundings and realised that he was currently stood on the bridge, over at Pidge’s control panel, looking down at the jumble of information she’d brought up on her screen.

The green paladin huffed in irritation but turned away to return to the screen behind her, tapping her fingers quickly and bringing several images up on the main screen. “I was saying- I think this lead is something that we can’t just brush under the carpet. I’ve been speaking to Matt and he says the rebels are all go on attacking this prison ship, but, it’s no easy task.”

Lance took a few steps forward to inspect each image intensely, it seemed like Pidge had pulled up images on a galra cruiser but it wasn’t like any Lance had ever seen before. The armour over its hull was intense, even in some of the close up shots there didn’t seem to be a single weak spot. Then there was the top of the ship, the artillery seemed primitive compared to the ion cannons and other such the team had tackled before but each blaster seemed well placed, leaving not a single inch of the ship unprotected.

“Where are the blind spots?”

“That’s just the thing. The rebels have been yet to find one, and even with all the information we’ve collected, I’ve never seen a ship like this before. Our usual entry points don’t even exist on this ship.”

“So?” Lance hummed. “You wouldn’t be bringing this to me unless you had something up your sleeve.”

Pidge turned to give Lance one of her devilish smirks that in the old days would send shivers down Lance’s spine.

“Of course I do.” Pidge grinned again, a gleam in her eye as she began typing frantically again. In an instant all the images on the screen disappeared and were replaced with just one.

“What is that?”

“Think of it as the galra equivalent of a mail slot.”

“... What?”

“It’s a mail slot. The smallest and only penetrable gap in the armour that leads into the ship.” Pidge let out a cheeky giggle as they zoomed in further. It was difficult to tell the size of the gap from the image but if it really was some sort of mail slot, it’s not like it would fit a person through.

“Okay. So… Do you have a shrink ray in the works or something? That still doesn’t explain how we’re going to get in unseen.”

“Have you met the rebels, Lance?” Pidge rolled their eyes in amusement. “Those guys wouldn’t know stealth if it jabbed them in the ass with a stick. They’re all about the offensive, they’re going to cover us as we go in with the green lion and get inside.”

Lance raised an eyebrow in confusion as he walked Pidge bring them image down from the screen and turn the console off before looking back to him. “How do you expect us to do that?”

“That’s where you come in.” Pidge turned on the heel and began to walk, Lance quickly followed after them, his brain a gobbled mess from the confusion. “I’ve been working on a little something that I think you might enjoy the most.”

Lance followed Pidge out of the bridge and down the long corridor till they reached Pidge’s hanger. The entire journey down, Lance listened the best he could as Pidge explained the science behind this new… weapon? Tool? Lance still wasn’t sure.

When they finally reached the hangar, Pidge took off in a run to her station and opened one of the drawers of her containment unit.

“Here we are then. Give this a little look.”

As soon as Lance laid his eyes to the beauty in Pidge’s hands, his eyes almost bulged out of his head. “Is that a grenade launcher?”

Lance reached forward to try and take the tool from Pidge but before he could, the young paladin retches her hands away and out of Lance’s reach.

“No it is not! This is much more than some primitive grenade launcher. It is a thermal response tactile launcher with GPS tracking implanted within the pellets.”

“Okay. Why? What’s wrong with a normal grenade launcher?”

Pidge glared at him as she finally released the weapon to him. “Hunk was busy and I was bored so I put some extras on it. If you don’t like it give it back.”

“No!” Lance gasped and cradled the launcher closer to his chest. “It’s my child now. Don’t take him away from me.”

“Are you putting together what my plan is though, Lance? I’m not giving you that as a toy to play with. It’s for the mission.”

“Mission?” Lance frowned. “Oh! Mission, yeah. No I haven’t pieced it together, I’m a little bit too preoccupied raising my son right now.”

“The plan, Sharpshooter, is for you to fire a pellet from this launcher through the mail slot, into the more vulnerable shaft, and blow a hole that is big enough for us to slip through. Since the galra will be pretty busy trying to go for the rebels, the security inside should hopefully be sparse enough so we just have enough time to get inside and get moving.”

Lance smirked and gave a cocky brandishing of the weapon. “Sounds easy enough, especially with me doing the shooting. But what’s the plan once we’re inside?”

“Well… We don’t really have one. The intel for this mission isn’t like the intel we get from Lotor. It’s sparse, not very detailed and honestly, I’m not sure what or even who we’re going to find on that ship.”

“You think you’re dad could be one of the prisoners?”

“I don’t want to not do anything just in case he is, but, my heart tells me he’s somewhere else… Still, better safe than sorry.”

Lance handed the launcher back to Pidge who stored it safely back in her containment unit before turning back to Lance, hands on hips, tapping her foot against the floor softly.

“Are you in?”

Lance raised a hand and scratched absentmindedly at his chin. Honestly, the team had gone on to galra cruisers with less information so it wasn’t the lack of intel that scared him, nor was it his ability to pull off his tasks. Lance was known for his target accuracy that generalised across multiple types of guns, he’d be able to pull off the shot. No, what worried him was a little more closer to home.

“What does Shiro think of this plan? He’s okay with just the two of us going on this pretty big mission.”

“Him and Allura have been arguing all morning.” Pidge lowered their head sadly for a second before recovering as best they could. Everyone was affected by the relationship shift between the black paladin and princess as of recent. “I tried to talk to him earlier and his response was basically that we can all do what we want until him and Allura work out what our next move is. Y’know with Lotor trapped in our basement, it’s putting the pair of them on edge.”

“I’m aware, he’s been seriously edgy with me lately.” Lance sighed. “I don’t want to go on this mission and come back to a lecture from space dad.”

Pidge grinned, that evil smirk returning. “I’ll take the blame. We all know I’m his favourite and he never gets mad at me.”

“That’s only because you’re the baby.” Lance cooed just as Pidge tried to take a swipe at him. “Little baby Pidge, so small!”

Just as Pidge went to reach for her bayard on the table, Lance high tailed and sprinted out the other direction, shouting his agreement to go with her as he went.

He didn’t stop running until he reached his room and quickly changed out of his normal “walking-around-the-castle-with-nothing-to-do” clothes and into his skin tight paladin suit that he’d left elegantly draped over the chair next to his desk.

Over the next few minutes, Lance wandered back and forth across his room picking up and putting on the individual parts of his armour that were scattered on every surface available. He changed slowly and carefully, making sure he did up every buckle and tightened every elastic band until the armour hugged him tightly. When he was pretty much finished, he grabbed his bayard from the middle of his desk and fastened it to his waist to make sure he didn’t lose or drop it before searching one final time for the past piece of his armour.

His helmet.

“Quiznack!” Lance growled in irritation, he checked inside his cupboard, under his bed, all of his drawers and yet he still couldn’t find that final piece. “Where did I leave that stupid thing?”

He searched top to bottom of his room but there was just no sign of the blue helmet anyway. With a sigh of irritation, Lance concluded that his helmet must have been left elsewhere in the castle.

The next fifteen minutes were spent with Lance running around different areas of the castle trying to find his helmet, he ran to the bridge, to the lounge, a quick trek into the kitchen where he quickly met up with Hunk and asked him if he knew where Lance’s helmet was.

“I don’t know, buddy. Last time I saw you with it was during dinner a few days ago before you went to bed. Are you sure you checked all over your room?” Hunk was halfway through baking some new interesting creation but since Lance couldn’t stick around he wouldn’t be able to try it. He bid Hunk a quick goodbye before he went searching again.

“After dinner…” Lance mumbled to himself as he walked, trying to kick his memory into gear as he remembered the dinner Hunk was referring to. Allura and Lance had just got back from a quick trip to the planet they were orbitings service in order to collect some supplies, food, water and the like. Then when they returned, Hunk had made this lasagne recreation with some ingredients he’d been collected but the lasagne actually tasted more like fish.

Then what happened?

Lance had been feeling low and tired all day so he… Went to bed early? He bid everyone good night and headed to his room.

“No wait.” Lance stopped dead in his tracks. “No I didn’t.”

With a quick swerve on his heel, Lance pulled a 180 degree turn and headed back the direction he’d come towards the other bedrooms he’d walked past until he reached the one he meant to be at.

He opened the door cautiously, checking to make sure no one was around before heading in, and sure enough, there was his helmet on the end of the perfectly made bed. Staring at him as if betrayed that Lance had forgotten about it for so long.

Lance quickly picked it up and jumped out of the room before anyone could realise he’d been in there. It would be a bit embarrassing if people found out that Lance had left his helmet in Keith’s room after he’d woken up from taking a long nap in there the other day when he had lied and told the group he was going to his own room to sleep.

Before Lance could think too deeply in the matter, he immediately sprinted back towards Pidge’s direction and into her hanger where she was no doubt waiting for him at the bottom of her lion, tapping her foot impatiently, fully dressed in her paladin armour.

And she was.

“Come on, Lance. We have to go!” Pidge called down the hanger just as Lance entered, standing at the bottom of green’s platform. “We have to get to the rebel base to gear up first and if we don’t hurry the battle will be over when we arrive.”

“Sorry! Sorry!” Lance called sprinting as fast as his legs could take him until he jumped inside of the green lion. “I couldn’t find my helmet.”

“How did you lose your helmet?” Pidge grumbled as she swiftly followed behind him, the platform raising behind her until green closed shut awaiting further controls from her paladin.

Lance didn’t particularly want to explain the whole problem with sleeping between two rooms so just stayed silent and sat down in the extra seat that Pidge had erected in here a while back for when her brother flew with her.

The distance wasn’t actually as far as Lance had expected to be, given the amount of time they usually spend just flying from point A to B, Lance had mentally prepared himself for a massively long journey but within a couple of hours Pidge was already initiating her comms and connecting to the rebel base.

“State your intent.” A voice called across Green’s speakers.

Katie leaned forward in their seat and spoke clearly in response. “Katie “Pidge” Holt. Access code Mambo number 5. I repeat. Mambo number 5.”

“Access granted.”

“Why on earth is that the access code?” Lance rolled his eyes, smiling nonetheless.

Pidge chuckled back. “Matt changes the access code every single day and each code is just going down his old playlist that he used to play while he studied for his exams.”

“Fair enough.” Lance accepted but he couldn’t help but imagine the thought of a slightly younger Matt dancing around his room to Lou Bega with a quantum physics textbook in his hands.

“And because I know you’re thinking about it…” Pidge mumbled. “My brother can’t dance… But he always tried.”

“Thank you.”

Not long after that, Pidge pulled green into the hanger of the base and locked her down before the two made a swift exit from the cockpit and out. Since Pidge was a frequent visitor of the base, she usually didn’t need an escort if her brother failed to meet her in the hanger so the two were met to no one.

“Lazy ass.” Pidge grumbled as she stepped forward to head in the direction of Matt’s workspace.  They walked for a good few minutes before pushing their way through a slightly ajar door and spotted Matt standing in the middle of the room, fiddling with something between his fingers.

“Matthew.” Pidge called loudly even though he would’ve noticed her if she’d spoke normally, but her volume managed to surprise him enough to drop whatever it was he was holding and immediately abandon it as he caught sight of his sister.

“Katie!” Matt shouted in glee before running over dramatically taking his sister in his arms, lifting her high and spinning her around in the air.

“Matt!” Pidge squealed in surprise, punching at his shoulders. “Put me down!”

Matt quickly complied to save himself from a beating but quickly wrapped his sister up in a regular hug, squeezing her smaller form tightly. Lance could hear the grunt escape Pidge’s throat but if she was uncomfortable, she made no move to escape, just hugged her brother back until he eventually pulled away.

“I’ve missed you!” Matt smiled, tuffling his sisters hair immediately after she took her helmet off. “But I’ve been keeping myself busy while you’ve not been around, of course.”

“Ooh, so what has my big brother been making recently?” Pidge giggled menacingly before taking off like a rocket towards Matt’s computer and immediately tapping at keys at a speed that Lance was worried smoke would appear from her fingertips.

Lance turned back to Matt who was looking towards his sister with a deep level of pride and amusement that sank Lance’s heart just a little. When Matt smiled like that, he actually looked a lot like Lance’s brother Marco.

“Lance.” Matt suddenly smiled again as he turned his head towards him.

“Hey Matt, how’ve you been?” Lance stretched forward a hand for Matt to take.

“I’ve been good. It’s good to see you again, Lance.” Matt smiled politely, taking a tight hold of Lance’s outstretched hand and pulling him in for a tight hug. Though surprised at first, Lance matched Matt’s tight hold with same enthusiasm and the two stayed like for that for a couple of seconds before pulling away.

“Matt, what is this?” Pidge suddenly spoke up from the corner of the room, still typing at Matt’s computer.

“What is what?”

“This.”

“Oh. It’s a battle plan I’ve put in place for my team.” Matt smiled proudly as he walked over to join his sister, Lance following along beside him. “I used an algorithm they taught us back at the garrison and tweaked it to fit the situation and came up with this. Pretty impressive right.”

“So what? You’re a battle strategist now?” Pidge snorted but Lance could see the impressed smile she held.

“Of course.” Matt smirked. “I’ve got to put my skills somewhere and using this algorithm, I’ve formed a perfect offensive pattern that’ll keep us protected from every angle.”

Lance frowned at the screen as he inspected the layout but he could see an error in the placement that Matt must have missed. He wanted to point it out but his insecurity got to him for a second so he stayed silent.

“Lance. What do you think?” Matt turned to face him with a confident smile that made Lance even more guilty about what he was going to say now.

“It is amazing, I’ve never even thought about the use of Math in order to create a battle plan... but there is one thing, there, you’ve left your entire back left flank open.” Lance pointed towards the screen on the left side of the placement of the ships. “You’ll be completely vulnerable on that side if the fighters come at you from there.”

“Wait, what?” Matt gasped, looking to where Lance was pointing and creasing his brows in confusion. “Oh no. You’re right… But we don’t have enough of our ships to cover that blindspot.”

“Well… May I?” Lance stepped forward closer to the screen, after a swift nod of Matt’s head he reached towards one of the ships in the middle of the force and slowly shifted it’s position a little further left and closer towards the back, then moved a second ship closer to the right a little bit more into the middle. “In an ideal situation, you’d put another ship just right in that left back corner but since you’re trying to spread the forces you already have, moving someone to cover the blind spot and then taking a little bit of your force from the right and shifting it just a little bit more central will cover the blanks.”

“I see.” Matt nodded his head in understanding.

“Since the back end of a force is always sparse you’d be best putting three of your best just in that back right, back left and back central since those three will be covering the most distance to protect the rest of the team due to this lack of fighters. Then, the fighters with less distance to cover, i.e. your left flank and right, will be your usual fighters. Stick your more armoured ships at the front and then the commander takes the central so they have the best view of the fight and can direct the force the direction of movement.” Lance continued, touching different ships on the screen to highlight them as he spoke.

“Wow, Lance. I didn’t realise you were so good at this.” Matt chuckled but he quickly rested both hands on Lance’s shoulders and squeezed in excitement. “This will really be a step up from what we’re used to.”

“Lance may be the goofball of the paladins but he has his skills in battle.” Pidge smiled good heartedly at the pair.

“Please. It’s just from playing too many battle video games with my brothers when I was younger.” Lance rubbed at the back of his neck again. “I’m no strategist.”

“I don’t know about that.” Matt smirked and suddenly started shaking at Lance’s shoulders like he was a rag doll. “I’m so excited, this is totally going to work.”

“So, when are we going?” Pidge asked. ‘How far are we from the cruiser?”

“Navigator told me that the cruiser is about 5 vargas out from our current location but heading in our direction. We’d be better leaving now and getting clear of the base to prevent suspicion from the galra leaders on the ship of how we’ve found them.” Matt explained, grabbing his keyboard from Pidge and switching off the computer. “So. Let’s go inform the rally.”

The trio headed down to the main hangar of the base where it seemed that everyone was already hustling their weight to try and get ready for leaving. Matt walked off for a second to tak to what looked like one of the fighters, leaving Pidge and Lance to assess their surroundings.

“They’ve lost ships again.” Lance mumbled. “I remember there being more than this last time we were here.”

“That’s why that battle plan is so important. The rebels can’t afford the losses they’ve been taking over recent years.” Pidge sighed sadly. “I didn’t even want the rebels to come with on this mission, with green’s cloaking we would’ve been able to make it in fine. But it’s their intel and Matt’s convinced that it’s the getting out that is the hard part. So whether I like it or not, they’re coming.”

“Well… You know what they say. The more the merrier.”

Pidge turned to him with a glare. “Anyone who says that is a liar.”

“... Well alright.”


	2. Chapter Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes, missions don't go the way you expect them too.
> 
> Sometimes, writers don't have any knowledge of physics or actual realistic scenarios that can happen.  
> Oh well, the characters of this story fly lions in space. It doesn't have to be perfect.

“Okay. The fighters are waiting in their crafts. They’re just waiting for my say so to set off. Are you two ready?” Matt signalled to the waiting shipping behind him as Pidge tapped some final pieces of code into her arm piece. When she was finishing, she dropped her arm and smiled in determination with a nod.

Matt smiled in response to her. “Alright. Make your way to Green and we will follow you out.”

The group split, Lance and Pidge heading towards Pidge’s lion in the second hangar while Matt turned back and headed towards his already waiting craft. The paladin pairing quickly broke into a jog when they heard the doors of Matt’s craft close behind him.

Thankfully the second hangar was only a few seconds to get to, out of the first hangar, down the long corridor and then taking a right into the second one next door.

“How’re you feeling?” Lance smiled as the two entered the second hangar, Green already waiting for them with her platform down. 

“Fine.” Pidge mumbled back shortly.

The two entered and quickly made their way into their seats before Pidge set the lion in motion. The doors closed, Green lifted her paws from the air before slowly and carefully maneuvering them through the open roof of the hangar. 

When they reached the open air, Pidge set the Green lion into hovering, watching as the rooftop of the first hanger slowly opened.

“Pidge!” A voice suddenly called out over the transmitter, Lance instantly recognised it as Matt. “Are we a go?”

“Ready on your mark.”

“Alright, kids, let’s get this party started. Que the music.” Matt laughed. Just a second later, Lance could hear the roaring of engines starting up from inside before pod after pod began their swift exit out and towards the upper atmosphere. 

Pidge waited until every ship had exited the hangar, the last one being her brother’s before pointing her lion to the sky and accelerating up to follow the pack.

Before too long, the entire fleet were flying through deep space, making their way towards the prison ship with too many variables that were unknown to them, so many in fact that Lance could feel more bubbles in his tummy than he usually felt before a mission like this, only for some reason this time they felt even worse.

“You okay, Lance?” Pidge mumbled back. “You’ve been quiet for like… Five minutes. That’s not like you.”

“I’m fine.” Lance gulped, he didn’t feel awful but maybe fine wasn’t really the right word to use. He wanted to be a little more honest so he further explained what he could. “Just got the nerves a little, been a long time since I’ve gone on a mission without Red. You’d think I’d be used to it since we haven’t even been bonded that long but… I don’t know, shoot me, I kinda miss the girl. Don’t tell her I said that. You too Green, keep your metanical lips  _ cerrados, esta bien? _ ”

“You know you and Red are bonded right? She already knows you like her.”

“No she does not!”

“Of course she does, she has the capability to read your thoughts, Lance. You think she hasn’t?” 

Lance snorted in disbelief. “Please. She’s too busy comparing my flying skills to her last two paladins, she’s probably a bit too busy to go digging in this cavern. Even if it is a goldmine.”

Pidge sighed but didn’t reply again and the two fell into silence for a few more minutes, Lance tapping his foot anxiously.

“So, Matt said we’re about 5 vargas out?” Lance gulped.

“Probably closer to 4 now if the ship continued on their same heading.” Pidge mumbled before groaning. “Do not even think about telling me you need to stop and pee quick, I asked you before we left.”

“No, no… I was just going to ask if Green had like… I don’t know, a playlist. I think we’re going to need some serious show tunes for this journey.”

Pidge didn’t answer for a while, and for a moment Lance thought that she was going to entirely blank him since it wasn’t like she knew that Lance was sat there painting his seat brown almost but, suddenly she reached to one side and pressed a button on her control panel.

Not even a second later, old earthian music from the early 2000s began to filter from Green’s speakers, loud enough for Lance to immediately sing along under his breath but quiet enough to hear the transmitter if any of the rebels contacted them on the way there.

“You’re lucky I’m letting you listen to this.” Pidge mumbled. “This is Matt’s playlist. I recreated it to listen to during times when I thought I’d reached a dead end in the search to find him. There’s some really cringey stuff in here because… Well Matt is a walking cringe. But if you make fun of anything, I’m immediately turning it off.”

Lance chuckled softly before whispering beneath his breath, so quiet that Pidge wouldn’t have even been able to hear him at all. “Never.”

Thus, their journey continued just like that. Occasionally, the two paladins conversed, mostly running down the plan between each other, not that there really was one. Blow up the letterbox, get in, hope to god they stumble across, like, a floor map or something because how the hell were they going to find the cells on a ship they’d never been to before. Lance tapping his feet and managing to keep his nerves in check as he focused on the beat of every song that played from that moment until the moment where Matt’s face flashed up on Green’s dashboard.

“We’re a few dobashes out. The ship is going to be able to pick us up on their radars soon.” Matt no longer held his usual goofy smile. He was stoic and professional, ready for battle. “You guys should go dark now. Fly at the back of the fleet until they release their fighters then make your way to the drop off.”

“Got it.” Pidge nodded. “Engaging cloak.”

Pidge pressed a button her dash and Green spluttered for just a second before normalising. 

Lance gulped. “Did it do it?”

“Yes.”

Immediately, Pidge steered Green back to the back of the fleet who all simultaneously engaging their full thrusters and began increasing their speed exponentially towards the growing shadow approaching them.

“Holy crap.” Lance gulped a minute later as the shadow began to take shape. “It’s huge!”

It was bigger than any cruiser Lance had seen anyway. Not by a lot, perhaps, but it sure felt like a monster of a ship as they quickly approached it. 

“Alright, rebels.” Matt called out once more. “Stay in formation, they’re going to be aware of our presence by now so when they start shooting, follow my directions.”

Not even a minute later, Lance watched as the galra beast began to echo a large drumming sound, even in Green, Lance had to cover his ears because of the volume.

“Okay. They’ve got us.” Pidge nodded, still following the pack. “Lance, go towards the lower deck, the blaster is waiting there for you, ready your shot. I’ll join you when we’re in position.”

Lance nodded, jumping to his feet and following his orders, he exited the cockpit and immediately made his way down to the lower deck, positioned above Green’s mechanical stomach. When he entered, he immediately clocked the launcher pinned against the wall and grabbed it, he twisted it in his hands and began fiddling with all the knobs and buttons.

“Pidge, how many shots does this thing have?” Lance called out, the transmitter on his helmet carrying his message to the green paladin.

“One. I’ve already loaded it, you just need to point, shoot, and don’t miss.” Pidge called back. “Hold on to something, we’re breaking away from the fleet now.”

Lance immediately grabbed ahold of one of the bars on the walls and held on tightly as the Green lion suddenly swerved to the left, if Lance hadn’t been holding on he would’ve been swept up from the force if the turn.

Pidge grunted down the receiver before steadying herself again, as well as the Green lion. “Alright, I’m setting us into cruise, we should be coming up the the slot in 30 ticks. I’m opening the side hatch now. Careful of the pressure.”

Lance released his death grip and made his way to the opening side hatch, the shifting pressure only helped to pull him closer as Green’s indoor makeshift gravity began to shift, making Lance lighter on his feet. He looked to the outside and his mouth immediately dropped open, Pidge’s pictures from earlier were nothing compared to the real thing. The ship was jet black and it looked as if it had been made from one large solid piece of metal, no corners that had been welded together to make for the ships sheer massive size. How had the galra done this?

A second later, Pidge charged in, their lack of central gravity kept them hovering just a few centimeters from the ground as they stepped behind Lance, enough to see through the hatch, but far enough that Lance didn’t feel his presence looking over his shoulder.

“Okay. You’ve got 10 ticks, Lance. Are you ready?”

Lance nodded, positioning the barrel of the launcher against the bottom of the gap in order to steady his grip. It wasn’t often he took shots like this, little gravity to hold him down while he aimed his shot.

“Approaching the gap now. You’ve gotta make this, Lance. 5 ticks.”

“I got this Pidge.”

The slot came in to sight but Lance could only just make it out against the rest of the solid black ship.

“Three.” Pidge gulped. “Two. One.”

“Not yet.” Lance frowned, they weren’t in the right position, if Lance took the shot now he would surely miss.

“Lance, now!”

“Hang on.”

“Lance! Take the shot now!”

“Just one… more… second.” Lance whispered as the ship better aligned with the slot, Lance could see the light from inside shine through the hole, the light caught in his eye and Lance couldn’t help but smirk, and that is when he fired. As soon as the pellet left the gun, Lance could no longer see it through the dark, but he trusted his judgement and counted down in his head. 3. 2. 1.

_ Bang! _

The slot suddenly burst open in a ball of light, Lance quickly turned his back to protect himself from any debris. When he turned back, the rectangular, perfectly shaped slot was now a much larger hole with warped metal curling out, increasing the size to fit the paladins to squeeze through to get inside.

“Lance, you did it!” Pidge gawped from behind him. “How did you-”

“You brought the sharpshooter for a reason right?”

“Careful, Lance.” Pidge snorted, reaching to the wall to press a button, the side hatch immediately closed and was replaced by the opening of the hatch on Green’s stomach. “You might start sounding cool.”

“I am cool.” Lance squaked back.

“Sure.” Pidge snorted. “Okay, so we’ve got to exit from green and use our thrusters to aim ourselves through into the gap. I’ve already programmed Green to smash through the hole after we’ve already climbed in, in precisely 20 dobashes, by then it won’t matter how loud we are, so she can just make herself a seat, and we’ll be able to load the prisoners on easily.”

“Okay.” Lance nodded.

“I say we’ve got maybe one hour before we’re going to need to get completely clear if we want to save ourselves from any loses. You think you can manage it?”

“Of course.” Lance smirked, engaging his helmet to supply him oxygen while he gets through this initial room. 

“Do not disengage your thrusters until we make it to the first bulkhead.” Pidge commanded. “The pressure in this first room is going to try and push us back out into space. You got it?”

“I passed physics, Pidge.”

The girl nodded and the two positioned themselves over the hatch. Without a second thought, Pidge jumped with Lance quickly following and the pair engaged their thrusters and began to head back towards the hole in the ship. Since Green had continued cruising after the shot was made, it took them a few ticks to get themselves to the hole, careful not to catch themselves on any of the heated, bent metal before getting inside. Lance followed as Pidge turned to the right, and continued to thrust until she made it the waiting, locked bulk head.

“Unlocking now.” Pidge declared as she held on to the large clock handle and pressed a few buttons on her arm piece before holding the piece up to the door. After a few ticks, the door clicked and Pidge opened the handle before pushing the door. “Lance, help.”

Lance pushed his thrusters to max and slammed himself forward and into the door, with the opposite pressure, his body slammed into the door, shoulder first and very slowly began to shift open, just a little more and the pressure would equalise and…

The door immediately slammed open and air from the second room, rushed out, almost pushing the two paladins back, but they held strong and shot themselves through the gap before reaching behind the bulk to close it again. 

Lance used every muscle in his body to push the bulkhead, thankfully, as the pressure shifted once more, the door slammed shut and locked itself again. Lance felt the fake-gravity meet him at once and he dropped from the air down onto his shaky legs.

“P-Piece of cake.” He gulped for breath.

“Not for long.” Pidge groaned when suddenly the two were thrown across the corridor from a bang further down the ship, knocking them over. The bangs continued and Lance had to grip at the wall to stop himself from flying over the place. 

“Seems they managed to get through the shields already.” Lance gulped. “That’s a nice surprise.”

“You go and get the prisoners. I’ll go to the control room and download their intel before meeting you there.” Pidge shouted through the onslaught of bangs and explosions echoing from all areas of the ships. “I won’t have any schematics to lead you so just try searching for what you can while you wait, as soon as I’ve downloaded the intel I’ll tell you the way if you’re not there already.”

“On it.” Lance nodded before reaching to his bayard at his hip.

The two immediately parted, Pidge heading straight forward while Lance headed left in order to make his way deeper into the ship. He ran through corridor after corridor and thankfully, Pidge had been right, due to the rebels outside the corridors were sparse, Lance had only seen and taken out a handful of sentries so far and hadn’t seen a single galra, or a single prison cell. How the hell was he going to find it on a ship this book?

“Pidge, what’s your ETA?”

“Sorry. I’m here now. Couple more sentries here than I was expecting.” Pidge immediately shot back down the receiver. “Just downloading the data now. Where are you?”

“No idea.” Lance shot back, pressing his back against the wall so he could watch is 9, 12, and 3. 

“Hang on, I’ve just got the schematics on my arm piece. Let me find you.”

“Find me quick, Pidge, those damn explosions aren’t going to last forever.”

For a minute, Pidge fell silent and all Lance could hear was the harsh beating of his own heart in his chest, banging against his ribs like a drum beat.

“Found you. You’re on the right track.” Pidge suddenly blared through the receiver once more. “Continue down the corridor until you reach the T junction at the end, then take a right. There should be a massive bulkhead blocking you from getting inside the cell unit but if you give me a few dobashes, I should be able to trip the system and unlock the door for you.”

Lance immediately took off into a sprint, firing another dozen blind shots at the few remaining sentries. “You’ve got 60 ticks, Pidge, make it happen. Also, see if you can get these sentries switched off as well, they’re starting to really climb up my ass.”

“I’m one person, Lance.” Pidge snapped back immediately before softening. “But I’ll try.”

Lance smiled as he continued running, he could no longer hear the metallic footfalls coming from behind him so he focused solely on getting down this long corridor. When Lance reached the end, he took the direction Pidge had told him and immediately found himself at the large, locked, bulkhead. Just before Lance was going to signal Pidge of his arrival, the door clicked and squeaked open.

“Door’s unlocked.” Pidge called and Lance didn’t need telling twice. He burst through, making his way into the cell block where dozens of aliens from dozens of races approached the bars of their cells.

“My name is Lance McClain. I am a paladin of voltron, do not be afraid, we are here to rescue you.” Lance called out, he ran to the first cell and shot the door lock with his blaster. Then he ran to the second, the third, the fourth and shot each door lock, immediately the room began to fill with aliens and Lance looked as they all helped each other remove themselves from their chains. 

“Lance!” Pidge called again. “There’s more than one cell unit, you’ve gotta make your way further down in order to get to everyone.”

“How many cell units are there?”

“I don’t know, I can’t tell from just from the schematics. It looks like 3 but it could be more. I’m on my way to you now so just do what you can.”

“Okay.” Lance nodded before calling out to the group. “Everyone, remain here, I have to go unlock the other cell blocks, call me if any centries approach.”

The prisoners nodded and began to scutter back into their unlocked cells in order to try and keep themselves hidden. Lance smiled as he twisted on his heels and immediately sprinted on. He reached another bulkhead and with a little heads up to Pidge, she immediately unlocked it for him and he pushed through. The second prison unit was smaller than the first with only two large cells rather than four. Lance unlocked both of them before instructing the prisoners the same as he had instructed the first before pushing on once more in search of this final cell block.

A third bulkhead stood in his way and he called out for Pidge. 

“I can’t see this bulkhead on the map!” Pidge called back in shock. “I can’t open what I can’t see, I’m sorry, Lance, you’ll have to find a way through.”

“Well… That’s fine.” Lance nodded and immediately raised his bayard and shot the door point blank, so hard that the lock snapped and it crashed backwards against his hinges. “I mean… They probably know we’re here now, what’s the point in being quiet now?”

Lance pushed through into the third cell block but was not met by any bars, the room was dark and dismal but the room was full of prisoners wearing the same purple prisoner clothes. Lance got to work immediately, grabbed prisoners and undoing their handcuffs before moving on to the next. 

After helping a few prisoners, Lance stopped and stared among the prisoners, the few he had quickly freed from their chains were already getting to their fellow cell dwellers and freeing them of their restraints. 

Lance watched as suddenly an elderly olkarion woman slowly broke through the crowd and approached Lance cautiously. “A paladin of Voltron? Here?”

“Yes. Two of us. My name is Lance, I’m the paladin of the red lion. We’ve come to rescue you.” Lance smiled politely but his head was still screwed into battle mode. “I’ve already visited cell blocks A and B, are there any other blocks on this ship?”

“No.” The woman spoke loudly over the scurrying of her cellmates. “We are the last one.”

Lance nodded his head, relieved that this was the last block to visit so that he could get everyone off this damn ship. Just as the group were beginning to stop scurrying and turning to Lance to know what to do next, Lance caught sight of a small shadow lurking behind the other aliens.

Lance took a step forward to see better and as he did, his eyes adjusted to see a small, young looking alien child staring at him, hiding behind the legs of another inmate.

“Why is there a toddler here?” Lance suddenly contain his anger, snarling aloud and hoping someone would tell him that he was imagining it, that the galra army didn’t really hold young infants in chains.

“She was born here, paladin. She is a child of the cells. Her mother was captured half way through the gestation period, birthed here and thus the child has remained here.” The same elderly olkarion from before whispered uncomfortably, stepping in close to him so she didn’t have to raise her voice.

“And the mother?”

“Complications during the birth.” The elderly woman looked down to the floor, her face a picture of sadness. “The mother was a Brollonx. A proud race that has difficulty with conceiving, the entire birthing experience is very delicate and particular. Birthing in a place that wasn’t the birthing grounds on her home planet proved too much for the mother's body.”

Lance snarled angrily which cause the small child to cower from him slightly, stepping further back into the crowd, that wasn’t going to be safe for them, hiding behind them. Immediately Lance relaxed his facial expressions even though the anger was still present, he was the hero here, he had to inspire confidence in those that he was saving so that they might also save themselves.

“You know, I didn’t think it was possible to hate the Galra army more than I already did.” Lance whispered, bending down and sinking onto his knees, a tactic to try and beckon the child to approach him. He reached out a hand softly, the crowd surrounding the child slowly dispersed until the child stood alone, looking at Lance in both fear and curiosity. 

Cautiously, the young alien took a step towards him, holding their hands tightly in front of them.

“Hello there.” Lance whispered so not to scare them further. “My name is Lance. What’s your name?”

The child remained silent.

“You don’t have to be afraid, I’m not here to hurt you. Tell me your name, kiddo.”

“Elsie.” The child stuttered back.

Lance smiled as bright as he possibly could. “Elsie. That is a very pretty name. Are you okay, Elsie?”

The child seemed to shuffle on the balls of their three legs before whimpering. “My hand hurts.”

“Let me see your hand.” Lance whispered once more, slowly the young Brollonx child approached him before holding out their hand for Lance to see. Lance could see chafing around the wrist from the handcuffs that had been removed from her, chafing so bad that blue blood had dried in and around the wound.

“That looks very painful, Elsie.” Lance whispered. “Would you like to come with me and the others? We’ll be able to help your hand feel better when we get back to my house.”

“Your house?”

“Yes. We can leave this place, if you want, and go and get in my friend Pidge’s ship and she can drive us away. After that, Pidge and I can take all of you to see our house all the way on another planet, so we can heal your hands. Then, we can go visit our friends the Olkarie and if you like them, you can stay with them if you want. They are very nice.”

Lance was used to children, he’d spent a lot of time with his young nephews and nieces back on earth, although the young child may not have a gender, Elsie held a lot of typically feminine features. Their long cylinder ears almost looked like pigtails on to of their head, with a thin piece of fabric that fell on Elsie’s body like a summer dress after playing in the mud, though Lance knew the state of the fabric wasn’t due to any activities such as that. Their skin was almost a fuschia colour, and although the young child was obviously alien, Lance couldn’t help but think of his elder brother’s young daughter from back on earth. 

It was the pigtails. It had to be.

“You don’t have to be afraid.” Lance repeated. “I’m only here to help you.”

The young child nodded before stepping further into Lance’s space until she was pressed up against Lance’s chest.

“Do you mind if I pick you up, Elsie? So I can carry you to our ship.”

Elsie nodded again and without another word, Lance sweeped the young child into his arms and stood back up to his feet. “Okay. Is everyone else ready?”

Just as the group began to nod in agreement, Lance heard light but fast footsteps from behind him, he turned just in time to see the Green paladin jump through the broken bulkhead and stop in front of him. 

“Lance. Here you are.” Pidge gasped. “I found the other prisoners you got out and took them to Green where it’s safer. Is this the last cell block?”

“Yes.”

“Good. We don’t have much time, the rebels are struggling out there, they don’t know how much longer they can last. We have to go now.”

“Okay. Everybody, follow Pidge and I. We’ve gotta go now.”

The group immediately dispersed, with Pidge taking the lead, Lance shortly behind her carrying the young child in his arms, he watched as the rest of the prisoners followed after them, some struggling to keep up but were supported by the stronger ones of the group to make sure they didn’t fall behind.

“Following you, Pidge.” Lance gulped as they passed cell block B, then cell block A until they were back in the corridors from before.

They continued running like that, down corridor after corridor with Pidge directing them, the schematics open on their arm piece. They could still hear the bangs and explosions from nearby and occasionally, Lance’s heart would jump at what he thought were footsteps from too close to them.

It wasn’t long before Lance could place the sound of multiple metal footsteps from behind the pack, the group also noticing as they all began to simultaneously gasp and wince in fear.

“Lance. Sentries on our 6.” Pidge called out. Lance immediately pushed himself back against the wall, Pidge doing the same on the opposite side, allowing all the prisoners to charge past them and down towards Green’s hangar.

As the final one passed, Lance immediately jumped to Pidge and grabbed her by the arm to stop her from running.

“Pidge, take her.” Lance snapped, immediately but gently handing the young child into Pidge’s waiting arms before grabbing his bayard from his side. Instantaneously, the bayard transformed into Lances familiar blaster which he immediately aimed towards the approaching sentries and fired multiple shots at them.  “Go, go! I’m right behind you.”

“Lance, we have to stay together.”

“Get everybody loaded on Green. I’ll keep the corridors clear. Now, go, Pidge!” Lance snapped, immediately firing more shots as more sentries rounded around the corridor, heading straight towards them. 

Lance flashed up his shield and knelt down in order to have the shield cover as much of his body as he could before aiming his blaster around the side and firing off consecutive warning shots at the still approaching sentries.

Lance continued to fire shot after shot until no sentries were in sight, just as he was about to stop shooting he felt a shifting movement at his feet before suddenly he was thrown up into the air, knocking the wind out of him.

Quick into attack mode, Lance recovered and immediately pushed against his legs to push him back and into the attacker who had pushed the platform beneath his feet up, effectively knocking him off his guard for just a moment.

The attacker was tall, quick, obviously galra as they suddenly span around Lance who was pummelling his bayard through the air in order to make contact. Knocked back slightly again, Lance span to meet the attacker who had jumped around his back, aiming his gun low and harsh until he suddenly smashed against his attackers stomach, but he couldn’t pull the trigger when he felt a cold stroke across his neck, paralyzing him in fear for just a second.

Lance looked up at his attack and was surprised to meet the mask of something not his enemy, but his friend. He gasped in surprise. “Blade.”

The blade shifted in surprise before their mask instantly dropped and Lance was thankfully met by a familiar face.

“Kolivan?” Lance gawped, removing his gun from pressed against his allies stomach. “What are you doing here?”

“Red paladin.” Kolivan immediately removed his knife from Lance’s throat and dropped it to his side. “We are on a mission of intelligence gathering. What are you doing here?”

“Umm…” Lance gulped, looking back behind him to find that Pidge had managed to clear out the corridor and was already making their way to Green’s whereabouts. “It’s a rescue.”

“You cleared the cell blocks?” Kolivan pointed an eyebrow, looking almost surprised. “Where are they all?”

“With Pidge. Which is where I should be.” Lance nodded. “Sorry to shoot and scoot but I’ve got some pressing issues elsewhere.”

“I will come with you, this place is swarming, it would be safer to partner up.” Kolivan explained, immediately chasing after Lance who had already tucked tail and started running in Pidge’s direction. 

Suddenly, the receiver in Lance’s ear cracked and buzzed causing Lance to wince until the sounds stopped and were replaced by a much clearer voice coming through.

“Everyone is on board and ready. Lance we have to go!” Pidge snapped through his helmet.

“I’m on my way. Get ready for take off.”

Kolivan and Lance continued running through corridor after corridor until they reached familiar corridors that would lead them straight to Green. They continued and running but just as Lance caught view of the closed bulkhead which would push him straight towards Pidge, a massive bang rocked the ship and Lance’s footing was lost, he slipped and felt his head immediately crash against the side of the wall.

“Paladin, this way is not safe.” Kolivan snapped. “We must go. Now.”

“But Pidge-”

“You will not make it to your fellow paladin down this path!” Kolivan snapped, no nonsense and straight to the point, Lance knew he had no choice but to listen. Kolivan was usually right. 

“Pidge, get out of here!” Lance called through his transmitter. “I can’t get to you, but don’t worry, I’ll find a way out with the blade.”

“The blade?” Pidge shouted back.

“I bumped into Kolivan, I’ll get out with him. Get the prisoners clear.”

“Alright. Stay safe, sharpshooter.”

“Always do.”

“Red Paladin, follow me!” Kolivan barked, taking off in the opposite direction that Pidge had gone. “My ship isn’t too far from here, I can get you off the this ship safely.”

Lance grabbed his bayard from the floor as he ran past, following after the blade leader, he could feel his thighs ache from the overuse but that didn’t stop him from running at his very top speed to keep up with Kolivan, who by the way had a pair of legs twice as long as Lance’s.

The two continued running until they made it to a small hangar, inside it was a small space craft with two other blade members stood in front of it, holding their battle stance for enemy sentries.

“Borok, Ledbroke, we’re leaving now.” Kolivan called out to them as he and Lance continued running towards them. The two blades jumped into the back of the spacecraft leaving Lance to jump in beside Kolivan in the front. Without pausing for breath, Kolivan immediately switched on the engines and the craft hovered slightly above the ground. “Ledbroke, open the hangar doors.”

“Yes sir.” A voice responded from the back, followed by a few sharp, loud beeps.

Immediately, a rumble could be heard from above them and to Lance’s amazement, the hangar doors slowly opened and Kolivan fired the four of them out through the gap and away from the enemy ship. Lance stared at the window and could already see the rebels and the Green lion escaping as fast as they could, back towards the rebel base. 

Lance gulped as he turned back to Kolivan. “Well… That went according to plan.”


	3. Chapter Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith is written a bit angry and a little mean in this story but don't worry. I kinda know what I'm doing with the poor child.

Lance stared out the window of the spacecraft, his face a strange mixture of nerves and excitement. They hadn’t been travelling for very long but it still felt like 3x what it actually was. It didn’t help that Kolivan remained stoic and quiet the entire time.

“So, are you guys still in the same place?” Lance gulped. “For your headquarters, I mean.”

Kolivan didn’t look up from the controls. “Not anymore. After that attack from Keith’s lion and obviously the added publicity the blade are getting, we decided to move on from our old headquarters. We are currently still looking for something suitable but for now we have been convening on planet Prector for the time being. That is where we are heading and where you will stay until your team come to collect you.”

“Oh yeah. I should probably let Pidge know that I’m okay.” Lance nodded in understanding, he reached forward to the controls and tried to tamper with the communications device but before he got a chance to properly look, Kolivan reached out a hand and pressed a button that was right in front of him.

“Allow me. I’ve been meaning to speak with the Princess but haven’t been able to find the time these last few days.”

Lance nodded his head as the video call flashed up on the window screen, immediately he was met by the sight of three paladins of voltron arguing with one another, with one worried looking Coran standing just at the edge of the screen.

“Paladins.” Kolivan spoke, his voice clear and authoritative, it almost made Lance shiver in his seat.

“Shiro, eno- Kolivan!” Allura turned to the screen with a look of surprise which immediately turned to relief. “Lance! Thank the ancients you’re alright.”

Lance nodded his head in embarrassment. “Sorry. I got separated from everyone. Is Pidge back yet? How’s Elsie? The child?”

“They got away fine and Pidge and Elsie will be staying with her brother and the rebels to go through the information they received from the ship, and also to help safely take the rescued prisoners to Olkarion, the Olkarie are already looking for a suitable home for her when she arrives.” Shiro explained, his face stoic but Lance could almost sense the disappointed dad atmosphere from here. “Pidge commed us to let us know about what had happened.”

“I can’t believe Pidge let you use the launcher first!” Hunk suddenly stepped forward to whine. “I totally dibbed first go, does that mean nothing these days?”

“Sorry, buddy.” Lance chuckled with some relief. “So… Are you guys coming to pick me up?”

“Of course.” Allura smiled but then her smile dropped for a second. “Though we won’t be able to use the teleduv still. So you’ll probably have to wait a couple of quintants while we maneuver our way to you. If that’s alright with Kolivan and the other blades, of course.”

“Of course, Princess. It will be a pleasure to have him.”

“Is Keith back at your base?” Hunk suddenly piped up with a smirk.

Kolivan nodded his in head swiftly. “He should be back from his previous mission by now, yes.”

“You can just get him to look after Lance, Lance is bound to get into mischief because he’s Lance so maybe giving him a guide like Keith will save you from any accidents.” Hunk turned to Lance and gave him one of his own evil grins, a grin that rivaled even Pidge’s.

Lance gawped. “That is not necessary, I’m not some chi-”

Kolivan immediately interrupted and as Lance turned to face him, he thought he could see a knowing smile faintly across his lips. “That sounds like a very good idea. I will notify Keith when we make it back to the base.”

“Kolivan, pl-”

“Don’t listen to him, Kolivan.” Hunk called out once more. “He needs someone to look after him or he’ll take down your very order from this inside with just a stumble over his own clumsy feet. Keith is the only one who’ll be able to keep in check.”

Lance shot his best space friend the most dirty look he could manage before turning his head away with a humph. He knew what Hunk was doing. Hunk was the only one who was aware of Lance’s slight crush on his red lion ancestor, and no he’s not talking about Allura’s dad. But what Hunk wasn’t aware of was the massive fight him and Keith had had the last time they were together face to face, an argument that they never sorted out.

“Thank you, Kolivan.” Allura interrupted before Lance could think of some witty remark back to shoot at Hunk. “Thank you again for protecting our red paladin. I will start the castle immediately and head towards your coordinates.”

“Of course, Princess. Farewell for now.” Kolivan nodded his head swiftly before ending the transmission.

Lance turned his head to speak, beg Kolivan to not tell Keith that he was coming, but it seemed Kolivan already knew what he was going to say as he stopped him completely.

“Young Keith will be most happy to see you.” Kolivan mumbled, not looking in Lance’s direction as he spoke. “He speaks of you and the other paladins very often, it will be nice for him to be able to catch up with you.”

Lance grunted, not really agreeing or disagreeing with Kolivan’s remark before falling flat in his seat. If it was up to him, Keith wouldn’t even know he was coming, let alone be forced to be Lance’s guard while he’s here.

Lance didn’t talk at all for the rest of the journey, just sat and sulked in his seat as Kolivan steered them towards their destination. The other blade members occasionally mumbling to themselves in the back.

Before too long and without Lance even realised, the craft suddenly jolted and rather than sailing through empty space like they had been before, the base suddenly appeared in front of them, grand and large.

“Space time?” Lance mumbled. “Like Ulaz’s place?”

“It’s a suitable layer of protection while we continue our hunt for a more permanent base of operations.” Kolivan explained.

Lance gave a swift nod of his head but didn’t speak more as Kolivan steered the ship into one of the ready open hangers. After a couple minutes of gentle landing, the craft stopped and the window disapperated allowing Lance and Kolivan to climb down into the open hanger.

“Meet me in the conference room in 15 minutes. We have much to discuss.” Kolivan turned to the blade members who were climbing from the back of the ship. “If you see Keith on your way, send him here for me.”

“No need, Sir.” One of the blades chuckled. “He’s right there. Waiting for you, as always.”

Kolivan turned, Lance following his gaze and sure enough, the previous red paladin was stood by the doors of the hanger, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest.

Once Kolivan caught sight of him, Keith pushed himself from the wall and began walking towards them.

Lance couldn’t help but stare, Keith looked quite a bit different than the last time he saw him. He even looked taller? Was that even possible? Lance silently hoped that he still had height bragging rights over Keith because lord knows he didn’t have much else to brag over Keith.

Keith crossed the hanger slowly. His eyes drifted from Kolivan onto Lance and he paused for a second, Lance noticed the way he flinched when he caught eyes with him. Taken aback but undeterred, Keith continued walking closer and closer, Lance felt his heart beat pick up and began to bob on the balls of his feet.

Keith stopped right in front of them, looking only at Kolivan.

“How was the mission?”

“We gained the intel we were hoping for. As well as an extra mouth.”

“Yeah. What’s he doing here?” Keith grumbled, not even looking Lance’s way.

Kolivan stepped forward and rested a calming hand on Lance’s shoulder, much needed since this interaction was already raising Lance’s blood pressure. “We were issued on the same mission and he got separated from his team. I’ve already sent word to the princess and the rest of the paladins, they will be here in the next 48 hours to collect him.”

Keith immediately rolled his eyes. “Great. Why 48 hours?”

Lance gulped as he answered. “The teleduv is still acting temperamental. Allura doesn’t want to risk jumping when she doesn’t need to, plus they’re not that far away and there’s no real rush to get me, right?”

Lance wouldn’t have minded the silent treatment, if that was what he got. Instead, Keith turned to him with a scoff and just glared right at him as if Lance was the future Zarkon in disguise or something.

“Fine. Just don’t bother me while you’re he-”

“Well actually, Keith.’ Kolivan raised his hand. “I’m issuing you as Lance’s guide while he is here. Make sure he gets to the meals, help him find his way around and give him something to do while he’s here.”

“What?” Keith gawped. “Seriously? Why me?”

Lance gave him a look of complete confusion. Why wouldn’t it be him? Keith and Lance are fellow paladins, not only that but Lance was once Keith’s right hand man not even that long ago. Does that not mean anything to Keith anymore?

“Because your next mission isn’t for another 5 quintants. You have plenty of time to look after your old teammate and still get some training in before you leave.” Kolivan spoke in a tone that was final and that the topic was no longer up for discussion. “So. I will leave you boys to it. Do not make too much trouble.”

Lance swiftly nodded his head whereas Keith just gave another role of his eyes.

Kolivan left in the direction he and Lance had come from but Lance didn’t have much time to watch him go as suddenly Keith was taking off in the opposite direction. Weaving down a few corridors as fast as he could while Lance just struggled to keep up, just a few paces behind him.

Lance felt his eyes wander as they walked and he couldn’t help but fixate on the black hair that cascaded down past Keith’s shoulders over his skin tight marmora suit that was just tight enough that Lance could really enjoy the soft peach swell of Keith’s ass as he walked in front.

Almost like he could sense Lance’s eyes on him, Keith turned back and glared hard before taking a sharp turn to the right, down another corridor before finally stopping a few doors down.

“This is where you’ll be sleeping. The canteen is back where we came from and to the left of the hanger. Meals are at 8 in the morning and 8 in the evening. If you’re late. You don’t eat. Training runs all day, there are three training rooms. You’ll probably be best suited with the recruits in training which is down at the end of this corridor.”

Lance smiled as politely as he could, but Keith was treating him like he didn’t even know him. They were teammates, didn’t that mean he was at least entitled to a smile? Lance would take one personalised question at this point? “Where do you train?”

“With Kolivan and the others. You won’t be able to handle it. If you get bored, join the recruits training. If not, stay in your room. You’ll get lost if you just go wondering around.”

Lance tried to laugh through the tense interaction. “Keith. My man. I am a wanderer by nature and I’m currently in the make-shift headquarters of the blade of marmora. I’m definitely going exploring.”

“If you go exploring then it’s me who has to go looking for you.” Keith suddenly growled in irritation. “I don’t know if you realise this, Lance, while you’re off in your own little world, but I’m extremely busy enough as it is. I don’t need to play babysitter for you.”

Lance took a step back immediately out of surprise. “O-Oh. Well… When you put it like that… I’ll let you get back to whatever you were doing. Thanks for showing me the way.”

Keith stepped out of the way as Lance made his way into the room and towards the bed, a small part of Lance hoped Keith would stay for just a few minutes, but he was sad to hear the sound of the door close behind him and Keith’s retreating footsteps getting further and further away.

“Right.” Lance gulped, looking around his surroundings since this was clearly where he’d be spending the next days of his life. The room seemed fairly bare apart from a few personal nicks around the room. A hairbrush on the counter, some muscle cream on the bedside table and as Lance looked into the cupboard, a couple pairs of legging type trousers, and a few black t-shirts that looked a little too big for Lance’s lanky frame.

Nevertheless, Lance quickly shed himself from his paladin armour, carefully placing it all in an empty drawers in the wardrobe before stripping from his paladin suit as well. He was feeling pretty achy and tired from the mission so there was no way he was going to be able to stay away till dinner so he wasn’t even going to try.

He snatched one of the large shirts and quickly threw it over his head, letting fall till it reached the bottom of his thighs. The material was soft and smelt strongly of earth's cinnamon though it was likely something else but it was more than suitable to sleep in for the night.

Without another rushing thought, Lance dropped himself on the soft looking mattress, grabbing at the thin blanket that was laid at the bottom of the bottom and using it cover himself. As he rested his head into the pillow, he was yet again met by that same cinnamon smell that Lance swears he remembered smelling somewhere else but couldn’t put his finger on it.

“If I forgot, it wasn’t important enough to remember.” Lance whispered to himself before his mind finally began to wander properly. Carrying him off into dreamland.

It didn’t take long for the dreams to catch up with him.

_He started out in a room of white, the sound of footsteps being the only inclination that he was here. Doing something. He turned a corner and suddenly the sound of the castle bedroom doors sliced against his eardrums and suddenly his vision returned as he stepped through the sliding doors._

_“So you’ve been hiding in here.” Lance sighed as he entered the bedroom that, he supposed, technically wasn’t his but he’d been sleeping in for quite a while now. “Matt told me what happened.”_

_Lance turned his eyes to Keith who was sprawled out across the bed, arms tucked behind his head and his eyebrows creasing in frustration._

_“Go away, Lance.”_

_“Not until we’ve talked. We can’t just brush over this, Keith.” Lance went to step forward towards him but as soon as he did Keith kicked himself up to a seated position and then jumping to his feet, grumbling and growling in irritation. Mumbling something under his breath about never getting any peace anymore._

_Keith went to step around Lance to get out the room but before he could Lance took the step with him and blocked his path, leading him backwards until the door closed fully and the two had some more privacy._

_“Keith. Please. Talk to me.” Lance reached a hand out but Keith immediately slapped it away and glared hard at him._

_“Move out of the way, Lance.”_

_“Why are you being like this?”_

_“Just do as I say, McClain!” Keith shouted at the top of his lungs, he stepped forward and pushed at Lance’s shoulders so hard that Lance crashed his back into the doors and had to use his hands to catch himself._

_As he steadied himself back on his feet, he thought he caught a look of regret cross Keith’s face, but if it was there it didn’t stay long before the anger returned and Keith readied himself in an attack stance._

_“So? What? This is what we are now? Do the past few months mean nothing?” Lance growled. “We’re no better than when we saved Shiro from the garrison?”_

_“What do you want from me?” Keith snapped. “What? Do you want me to cry on your shoulder? You want me to lay next to you in bed at night and whisper in your ears that it’s going to be okay? That we’re going to make it out of this war, that we can go home, that we’ll even have a home to go back to.”_

_“What- No, I just-”_

_“I can’t give you what you want, Lance. I won’t. I don’t want you.”_

_“T-That has nothing to do with this conversation right now.” Lance stuttered. “This is about your recklessness! You trying to destroy the barrier by sacrificing yourself, that is what we are talking about.”_

_“No. We are not talking about that, Lance.”_

_“Yes we are.” Lance snapped back. “How could you do that? If that asshole Lotor hadn’t been there we would have lost you, why would you do that, Keith?”_

_“Because that is the way!” Keith screamed so loud that Lance had to cover his ears. “The mission is greater than the man. Me running into that shield would have saved the lives of millions, thousands of planets. If you wanna make it into something deeper than you go ahead, Lance, but you’re on your own. I would make the same decision in heartbeat.”_

_“But you can’t ju-”_

_“I can and I will. Besides, why are you even nagging me with this shit? Prince Lotor obviously saved the day and I’m fine. No worse for wear than I was this morning. Now move out of my fucking way, Lance.”_

_Lance didn’t even have the chance to step away as suddenly he felt himself being pushed to one side before Keith charged past him, Lance felt his feet give way beneath him and felt himself tumbling down to the floor, but before he made contact, his vision flashed white again._

Lance awoke in a puddle of his own sweat, feeling more uncomfortable than he had yesterday by a greater margin. He pulled himself up and quickly peeled off the shirt he had been wearing before making his way into the ensuite bathroom attached to the room.

As he walked around the room, Lance couldn’t find any more personal effects whatsoever. Nothing to make the bathroom look like it had ever even been used before, a large red towel which was perfectly folded was the only seemingly movable object in the entire room.

“Well, at least I can shower.” Lance muttered as he pulled his boxers down his thighs and scrunched them up beneath his feet before climbing into the shower and switching on the water.

For a while, Lance just stood there beneath the shower spray, letting the water cover his face and chest. Since there was no soap anywhere in sight, Lance just scrubbed hard at his hair till it felt relatively clean before stepping out the shower and wrapping the towel around him.

The artificial light in the room was still quite dark so if Lance had to guess it was still early. He walked back into his room and toweled down completely before reaching into the cupboard to pull out a fresh shirt and a pair of those leggings.

“No boxers?” Lance grumbled, searching every drawer and corner of the cupboard but coming up empty. “I am not turning my underwear inside out, not after the exercise I did yesterday.”

So Lance pulled the leggings up his legs quickly, making sure enough loose fabric remained around his crotch before pulling the clean top over his head. The top was long on him anyway and covered any potential outline that may occur over the course of the day.

Soon after changing, while Lance was delicately combing through his hair with the brush, the lights lit up from their deep purple to a soft on the eyes light blue and just seconds later, the sounds of dozens of doors and footsteps in the corridor making their way in one direction.

“Must be breakfast.” Lance mumbled, quickly leaving the room without a second look. He followed the crowd all the way to the canteen and was a little taken aback by what do next. The room was filled with dozens of tables and several dozens of blades piled in and headed towards the counter where a particularly angry looking galra was serving up something that from here, looked like cut up carpet and definitely not something Lance would find edible.

But, beggars can’t be choosers, and Lance made his way to join the line. Waiting patiently as each galra were given their food on a large serving plate. When Lance finally reached the line, the chef raised an eyebrow at him as if questioning his very existence in this universe before suddenly turning around and procurring a smaller plate, with thankfully a lot less food on it.

“They bringin’ in more o’ you little fellas now?” The chef grumbled, his accent sounding like something from old cockney London mafia movie. “Givin’ me more mout’ t’ feed?”

“Just me.” Lance smiled as politely as he could. “Just for a few days. That I know of anyway.”

The chef grunted in response and signalled Lance to take his plate and move. Lance did just that, not wanting to stand and chit chat any longer anyway. He thanked the chef for his food before heading into the very back corner of the canteen to eat his food.

As he looked around at the other blades eating, not a single one was using cutlery and were picking the carpet squares up with their fingers and biting into them like crisps. Lance attempted to do the same, holding the large furry looking “food” between his fingers before cautiously pushing it inside of his mouth and biting a piece off.

It took exactly two seconds for Lance to know he hated it and put the rest down, pushing his plate away.

“Tastes like carpet too.” Lance mumbled to himself before standing to his feet, taking his plate to a wash box at the end of his table and immediately leaving without a second glance. He could wait till dinner to eat, he wasn’t particularly feeling up to eating anyway.

For the morning, Lance just stayed in his room, he decided to sleep for a couple more hours before waking up when the artificial lights shone a bright blue with flecks of yellow and gold going through them.

Lance assumed that was a good enough indication that it was probably near noon time of the cycle. Since the galra cycles ran by quintants, which although roughly was 24 hours long, because it was measured in vargas it was too much math for Lance’s little head to work out what time it actually was.

Still, it was definitely time to stop being lazy and do something. In fact, Lance was actually kind of excited to do a little bit of training. Get his heart pumping, maybe do a lot of stretching, focus on his body for once rather than his skill with a gun like Shiro often made him focus on.

Lance pulled on his shoes and swiftly left his room, going the direction that Keith had directed him to yesterday. He reached the door after only a couple of minutes and heard some gentle chatter from inside so deemed it was probably safe to at least check if this was the right room.

And it sure was.

As Lance entered the room, he felt all eyes twist to him. He tried to ignore the uncomfortable feeling in his stomach as he crossed the room heading towards a number of yoga mats laid out across the floor. Lance looked around and almost dropped his jaw at the room.

The room was probably somewhere around 50 feet tall and rivaled the length of Red’s hanger, stretched well over a football pitch size, and was filled with young looking galra, all with varying body types and sizes. Still, even the shortest of them reached well over Lance’s height so he couldn’t really make fun of any of them for being particularly short.

The only thing that made Lance feel a little quivery in his boots was that they were all staring right at him, not even subtly either, all of them were faced body towards him, staring at him like he didn’t belong there. Some with neutral expressions on their faces but a few were down right glaring at him.

“Quiznack this.” Lance whispered more to himself as he immediately turned around without another thought and made a swift exit from the room, not even slightly feeling awkward about walking in just to leave again.

After making his swift exit, Lance headed back down the long corridor, past his room and back towards the canteen, he was pretty sure he saw a bookshelf in there with some books of some sort in, perhaps he could find something worth reading while he waited since clearly training had been a bust.

Lance continued his angry stomp towards the canteen when suddenly, someone turned down a corner to quickly for Lance to catch and ended up knocking straight into, knocking Lance back down onto his ass.

“Ahh shit, sorry-” Lance looked up, lifting himself back up while rubbing at his saw cheeks. “Oh Kolivan. It’s you.”

“Red paladin?” The blade turned to face him completely. “What are you doing here?”

Lance gulped like he’d been caught red handed doing something he shouldn’t have been. “I was just trying to find some kind of empty training room. I was going to join the new recruits training but… Well, maybe it was just me, but they all seemed to be glaring at me for the short time I was there.”

Kolivan regarded him strangely, Lance couldn’t even tell what he was thinking. “The new recruits were probably a little hurt that a paladin of voltron was attending a beginner fighters class, perhaps their egos were a little bruised, they are our youngest fighters. Why not come train with me and the others? I’m sure no one would ever look down on a paladin of voltron in there.”

“R-Really? Keith said I wouldn’t be able to handle it.” Lance gulped, looking down at his feet in discomfort, he’d really gotten himself into a pickle now, he should’ve just stayed in his room.

“Our training is more personalised to fit the individual’s strengths. You pick and choose your own training and challenge yourself to the best of your abilities. Besides, the red paladin of Voltron not be able to handle it? I’m sure you could teach the lot of us a few things.”

Lance immediately blushed from the compliment but nodded his head in agreement. “I’d love to join then, thank you, Kolivan.”

Kolivan nodded his head and immediately turned on his heel to walk the direction he was originally heading, Lance tried his best to keep up but it really was a work out all on its own trying to keep up with a 7ft tall galra who was currently speed walking.

“Did you enjoy breakfast?” Kolivan suddenly spoke up, a galra’s attempt to make small talk Lance supposed.

“Umm… It was… Not what I was used to. Back in the castle we tend to mostly eat food goo.” Lance chuckled, rubbing at the back of his neck.

“We do have self-administrative food goo processors if the chef’s food is not to your liking.” Kolivan explained. “Even I myself find that the chef can be a little too… adventurous on occasion.”

“Mmh.” Lance agreed just as the two stopped outside of a large room, the sound of banging and clanging coming from inside.

“If anyone makes you feel uncomfortable, paladin, just join me at the weights and I’ll put you through a good workout that’ll have you lifting Zarkon from his very throne in no time.”

Lance smiled at the thought. “Thank you, Kolivan.”

The pair entered together and all eyes fell on him, but this time Lance didn’t feel nearly as uncomfortable. He felt confident walking across the floor, not even worrying about the eyes following him across the room, as he took in the layout of this training area.

Similar to the first training room, this room was well over 50ft high but the size was even larger, with ropes and platforms dotted all over the walls and ceiling, it looked like climbing frames from Lance’s childhood playground were stuck to the ceiling to make for an interesting, but deadly, game of monkey bars.

The room seemed almost split into 6 sections, one where Kolivan had remained was a weights section, filled with items similar to dumbells, to pipes, to wheels, to large engines of space crafts that Lance would not like to know who could life. The second section seemed like almost a boxing rink but only a few people were gathered around it, this was also when he caught sight of the back of Keith, jogging on one spot and practicing certain turns and moves with his sword.

Lance was determined to make sure Keith never even knew that he was here, so Lance headed straight towards the fourth section of the room that was faintly hidden by section 3 which was pretty much a massive climbing frame that stretched to celing.

Just before reaching the fourth section, which was obviously yoga mats because what else was little timid, out of his comfort zone Lance going to do in this room full of monsters, Lance stopped at the edge of the section to take off his shoes. He bent down at the back in order to undo his laces then gently pulled each shoe from his foot.

“Beautiful.”

Lance pulled up quickly, taken aback by the voice that came from right beside him. “Excuse me?”

“My apologies.” The same voice chuckled awkwardly, Lance twisted his body and was met by the sight of one of the blade members. He towered well over Lance and was built like something had of a action man film that Lance used to watch when he was a kid. “I just did not expect a paladin of voltron to be as exquisite as you are.”

Lance looked up to meet the blades eyes and was immediately taken aback. Though Galra, the blade member had extremely light skin then what Lance was used to, a light purple that was even lighter than Kolivan’s shade of purple. His eyes held the same yellow monochrome colour but, unlike others, Lance could see the kindness and gentility behind them.

“I- Umm…” Lance stuttered and mentally slapped himself for it. Was he a young teenager again trying to talk to his biggest crush? Why we he so nervous all of a sudden?

“My name is Dacor. It is a real pleasure to meet you, Paladin.” The blade member bent down to one knee and reached for Lance’s hand which he promptly pressed his lips against.

Lance pulled away, his entire body flushing bright red. “T-There is n-no need for such a greeting, Dacor. I-I’m not royalty.”

“You could’ve fooled me.” Dacor stood to his feet again, flashing Lance what could be dubbed the most flirtatious smirk Lance had ever seen, though half was hidden by the long fringe like hair that covered half of Dacors face and cascaded down past his shoulders until it stopped closer towards the top of his waist.

Lance cleared his throat as he offered out his hand to shake. “My name is Lance, it is nice to meet you as well.”

“Lance.” The blade purred out his name slowly, testing it on his tongue. Taking Lance’s hand once more and following the soft shaking motion Lance made. “It’s beautiful. A weapon chosen by those of more delicate decent. It suits you.”

Lance wasn’t quite sure if he was supposed to say thank you or not but he did anyway and bid the blade member farewell as he turned and began to head towards the yoga mat section of the room. Around all these well skilled blades, Lance didn’t really feel comfortable running his own training program like he would have back on the castle. Instead he decided that a little bit of stretching would probably help him out immensely.

It had been a while since Lance had really focused on the flexibility of his body and he was starting to notice the stiffness of his joints on missions, more so during the healing process after missions.

So, without another thought of good looking, flirtatious blade members or flippant ex black paladins who clearly had something against Lance as of recent, Lance got to work with his stretches. He focused first on his legs, taking the time to stretch each muscle and joint from his toes up to his hips. Then moving on to his arms, he took extra care over his shoulders which had been hurting the most as of late.

Stupid gun kickback.

After his arms, he quickly rotated his neck till he felt a lot more loose and began on his core, stretching to his right side with his left arm over his head before swapping to his left side. It didn’t take long for Lance to feel completely limbered and ready for anything.

Now he just had to get through this training without serious injury or incident.

Simple enough.


	4. Chapter Four

A few minutes into stretching, Lance got down onto his knees and ran through some old yoga poses he remembered from his experimental stage back when he was in the garrison. He’d attempted to start doing yoga in order to have something to do of an evening time because the garrison didn’t allow the students to have devices of any kind since they were afraid of secrets getting out.

Plus, there’s only so many nights that Hunk and Lance could stay up just talking about nothing, the pair had reached a stage in their friendship were silence was comfortable and sometimes it felt better to just be in each other’s company rather than force themselves to talk. So, while Hunk read or messed around with broken old radios, Lance did yoga.

But considering how long the duo were actually at the garrison as roommates, that didn’t last long and Lance is pretty sure he’s forgotten half the moves he used to do. He ran through the few poses he actually remembered and put them in order that made sense and were seamless to go through before restarting and doing each pose again. 

Whilst on his third run through of his poses, he got down onto all four and positioned himself into the thread the needle pose that he remembered fairly loosely, it was clearly a lot more loose than he thought because as he positioned himself, obviously incorrectly, something seemed to clench around his shoulder and he immediately recoiled from the pain.

Lance jumped from the pose immediately with a gasp of pain. He let his shoulders lose and rolled them, trying to relieve some of the sudden pain that was currently coursing through his body. 

“Are you alright, paladin?” 

Lance flinched, he turned slowly to meet the voice and was surprised as he stared up at the 7ft galra staring down at him with a carefree smile on their face.

“Oh. Dacor, right?” Lance continued with the young galra’s nod, still rolling his shoulders. “It’s fine. Just some sore muscles is all.”

“Here. Let me see.” Dacor smiled.

Lance took a step forward and stood completely still as Dacor circled around him, much like a big cat circling their next meal.

“Your shoulders are stiff.” Dacor stated as he took a loose hold of Lance’s arms, lifting them up till they stretched into the air. “You’re proficient with a gun? A rifle I would guess.”

“I dabble.” Lance gulped, heartbeat quickening as Dacor’s soft hands stroked from Lance’s wrists all the way down his arms and down to hold at his waist. Lance immediately flinched at the touch.

“Forgive my forwardness.” Dacor lightened his touch till his fingers brushed against Lance like feathers. “It is not often I come across beauty such as yours.”

“You-” Lance gulped again, feeling all eyes in the room shifting to the pair of them. “You are quite the charmer aren’t you?”

“Not at all.” Dacors hands travelled once more to Lance’s shoulder blades and slowly began to massage at the sore area. “I pride myself on my honestly. When I see something beautiful, I cannot stop myself from telling that something. I’m not making you uncomfortable, am I? I will stop if you do not like it.”

“Uh. It’s fine. I don’t mind.” Lance gasped as Dacor massaged a particularly painful area but as he fingers began to dig at his skin, the pain began to pass until the area felt numb. 

A few minutes passed exactly like that, a few blade members approached the pair and began making conversation happily. Dacor seemed quite popular among the group and happily socialised with his fellow blades and discussed their workouts, future missions and the like. Normally, Lance would have felt uncomfortable and left out, but the way Dacor’s hand held him and touched him as he spoke made Lance feel more included in something than he ever had been before. 

Another few minutes passed and Dacor removed his hands. “I have done what I can. Though I am no healer, I am well aware of the pain that comes when not taking proper care of overused muscles. You should watch those shoulders of yours in future, Lance.”

“You’re right, or else I’ll just have to come back so you can sort them out for me.” Lance joked, rolling his shoulders in complete surprise of how much pain Dacor had really relieved.

“On second thought, don’t take proper care. Just do that. Come and visit me.” Dacor chuckled, rolling his own shoulders and stretching his legs as he spoke. 

Lance couldn’t help but laugh, it had been a while since he’d had a conversation like this, flirtatious but not too serious. He enjoyed these conversations, he didn’t have them often anymore since most of the people he saw on a daily basis, i.e. the paladins of voltron and Coran, tended to shoo him off. Allura occasionally dabbled in the flirtatious banter but due to her mood as of late, Lance was lucky to even bring a smile out of her.

“So,  _ Lance _ , would you like to train together? I have always wanted to take up arms with a paladin of voltron.” The way Lance’s name slid of Dacor’s tongue was almost like velvet.

“You’ve never trained with Keith?” Lance chuckled.

Dacor seemed to pause and think for a second before chuckling as well. “That young blade has his own training regime set in place, it is quite rare he breaks it to train with us.”

“That sounds like him.” Lance nodded but following Dacor’s footsteps as he headed towards section 3, a bunch of blocks were stacked up, some reaching as high as 35ft tall with different platforms and intricate climbing techniques leading up to the top.

“This is my favourite training section.” Dacor explained. “It requires elegance and poise in order to control one’s body into reaching the top. It is also most handy for our missions given our stealth approach, it allows us to work with our surroundings, use it to our advantage and better learn how different aspects of our body deal differently with certain stimuli.”

“Are there ropes or is it freefall?” Lance gulped at the large feat in front of him.

“There are no ropes here, paladin.” Dacor smiled kindly. “Though, of course if you’d rather train another way, I’d happily follow you anywhere.”

“No.” Lance blushed bright crimson. “No, I can manage.”

“Okay, good. Then let’s go.” Dacor smirked before suddenly sprinting forward and jumping up the wall, his height making it easy for him to jump to the first platform 10 ft above the ground. “How about a race? First one to the top gets to take the other one out on a date.”

Lance spluttered in shock, both from Dacor’s ability and his statement. “You assume that I want to go on a date.”

“I do.” Dacor smirked behind is back and Lance before signalling him to join him. “Aren’t you coming?”

Lance groaned before taking a run up to the wall, giving Lance’s height, he knew he wouldn’t be able to reach the first platform so he aimed for the pieces protruding out of the wall, Lance had been rock climbing numerous times when he was a kid, on school trips and with his family so he knew he wouldn’t be too bad at getting up. 

Lance climbed as fast as his muscles would let him before he reached the first platform, Dacor reached a hand to help Lance over the ledge and up on to his feet, smiling at him flirtatiously the entire time. 

“Ready?” Dacor smirked as Lance steadied himself to go. “Good luck, Lance.”

The galra paused and suddenly pressed his lips against the paladin’s cheek before darting forward and up, using the wall as he guide up to the second platform. Lance however had been taken completely by surprise and was a blushing mess as he grabbed a hold of the next rock wall and pulled his body up, trying his best to hide his redness against the wall as he moved.

“That’s cheating, Dacor!” Lance growled in embarrassment as he continued making his way up, there was no way he was going to win. In a challenge like this, height was everything, and Lance’s 5 ft 9 was just no match for Dacor’s 5 ft infinity. 

And thus it continued like that, Dacor would wait at the edge of every ledge and help Lance when he reached him before taking off at top speed to the next platform to wait for him, if Dacor had done a straight run up he probably would have reached the top before Lance had even made it halfway, but Lance wasn’t insulted by the way the galra waited for him every time, in fact it made him feel a little more flustered each time he did it.

Lance finally reached the top, and again he felt his hand be grabbed and pulled in order to pull his weight up over the ledge and onto his feet, right into the arms of the one who had beat him. Lance stepped back just a smidgen, just to try and save his pride a little as Dacor chuckled at him.

“I won, Paladin.” Dacor smirked. “Now I do believe that the winner was entitled to one date?”

Lance chuckled as Dacor pulled him in again, it seemed like the tall galra couldn’t get enough of him, touching him every opportunity that he possibly could.

“We have to get down first, blade.” Lance whispered, fluttering his eyelashes like something out of a bad porn.

Dacor nodded and the two began eyeing their ways of getting down, the simple way was just climb down the way they came, or they could just the rock wall to climb from this top platform down to the bottom one and then just jump from there, but as Lance continued to search he caught something that caught his eye.

A fireman’s pole, Lance twisted and could see over that the pole went from the top platform all the way down to the floor, a very efficient mode to get down.

Lance eyed the fireman’s pole further at the corner of his eye as Dacor searched for his own way to get down, not yet clocking the pole hidden to their right since the pathway to it was blocked by another platform 5ft up that blocked it from Dacor’s view. Immediately, Lance felt a plan hatch inside his head and he couldn’t help the gentle giggle that left him.

“Sweeten the deal, double or nothing, rather than a date, the first one back down to the ground can ask for one favour from the other person and it cannot be refused.”

“How is that sweeter than a date?”

“Because…” Lance leant forward and rested his hand against Dacor’s waist. “You can ask for anything you could possibly want and your wish will be granted.”

“Hmm… No matter what?”

“No matter what.”

“Paladin. If I didn’t know any better, I would say that you are flirting with me.” Dacor chuckled, pulling Lance tight against his body.

“We only just met.” Lance purred back but didn’t reject Dacor’s statement. He was flirting, hell he was more than flirting, he was practically trying to pull the guy, right here on the platform.

Dacor smiled back in return before running his hand up and down Lance’s waist. “Well, alright, young paladin, you have yourself a deal. First one down gets-”

“Get set, go!” Lance suddenly pulled away before Dacor got the chance to finish and rocketed himself towards the pole, when he reached the platform he used all of weight to push down on the floor in order to jump up and grab the ledge. When his fingers met cold metal he was pleasantly surprised and used his upper body strength to yank himself up, his shoulders gave a little twinge in warning but before they got the chance to hurt Lance was already up and jumping forward, back down and across the platforms until he reached the fireman’s pole. 

He grabbed at the pole without a second to think and twisted his body around it, letting himself shoot down a little faster than was probably safe to do so. But the adrenaline was pumping and out of the corner of his eye he could see Dacor struggling to find a fast route down and elected to stop trying and stare as Lance shot down past him. 

Lance reached the ground just a few ticks later and cheered excitedly as he jumped from left to right, watching Dacor climb down the remaining distance out of the corner of his eye.

“You have skills with the pole, I see.” Dacor smirked as he finally jumped the final 10 feet down and reached the floor before approaching Lance slowly, swaying his hips from side to side.

Lance snorted at the double entendre before jumping up the pole again, grabbing it between his thighs and sliding down slowly and seductively until he reached the floor on his knees. “I’ve got some experience.”

“How?” Dacor couldn’t keep his mouth closed, gawping at the red paladin in complete awe of him. 

“Most humans appreciate a good pole.” Lance shrugged, standing back up his feet and jumping up, this time climbing up several feet, he twisted his body around until he span upside down, clinging the bar tightly around his back before stretching his legs to a 180 degree. He turned back before grabbing the pole again with his thighs, leaning backwards until his hands dangled loosely the in the air and his head tipped back. He showed a few more moves he knew of, making sure to switch into them slowly, sticking out his arse and shaking his hips where it was possible before finally climbing to the ground again and standing on his own two feet. 

Lance wasn’t a show off, but this whole game he and Dacor were playing was something he wasn't about to shy from. He always won this game.

“That was extremely impressive, Lance.” Dacor purred sweetly. “Good enough to eat.”

Lance smirked, moving to meet him when suddenly he heard the scuttle of feet approaching them.

“How did you slide down the pole like that?” Suddenly, another voice spoke up, disconnecting Lance from his lock on gaze on Dacor. Lance looked to see a few members of the blade approaching them quickly. “How did you get your body to bend like that?”

Suddenly feeling shy, Lance couldn’t bring his mouth to find the words to explain himself, but just he was about to try again, more blade members began to walk over. 

“Are all humans able to contort their bodies like that?”

“Where did you learn to get down without burning your hands?”

Lance took a back step in surprise and immediately bumped into the side of Dacor, Lance looked up to meet his eyes and Dacor responded quickly by looping one arm around Lance’s body, resting his hand on Lance’s waist before greeting the multiple members who had approached them.

“Lance and I were just working on our flexibility together.” Dacor purred, his voice like silk but Lance could hear the flirtatious insinuation in his tone. Lance delivered a joking elbow into Dacor’s stomach before he felt his confidence return to him. “Though, if I understand it correctly, not all humans have the same ability as you, do they Lance?”

Lance coughed before nodding his head. “Umm… Not all. But it is still a very common ability, it just comes from years of practice and work in order to maintain it.”

“How did you maintain it?” One of the shorter, younger looking blades who’d approached them asked.

“Umm… That’s kind of-” Lance didn’t really want to explain that he’d been attending dance lessons his entire life up until leaving for the garrison. Then even at the garrison, they offered classes such as gymnastics, dance, and a lot of pole fitness which Lance visited more often than not.

“Well-” Dacor suddenly laughed. “He’s a paladin of voltron, I’m sure that means he’s constantly practicing and maintaining his fitness. Am I assuming correct, Lance?”

“Y-Yes.” Lance chuckled awkwardly. What was going on with him? Why was he so nervous and shy all of a sudden? Was it just because he was on his own? Completely surrounded by trained marmora fighters. Each of whom had been properly been in the war against zarkon for decapheebs longer than Lance had. 

Lance could still feel Dacor’s hand around his waist and it was almost like his touch burned him, like a touch of fire pressing against the thin shirt wrapping around Lance’s torso. 

Lance turned his eyes across the room and suddenly caught eyes with Keith and Kolivan, staring right at him talking amongst themselves. Lance gulped anxiously, bouncing from one foot to the other in Dacor’s grip.

The handsome galra immediately noticed and bowed his head to reach Lance’s height better. “Are you alright, Lance?”

“Fine.” Lance chuckled nervously. “Just Kolivan is looking at us.”

Dacor turned his head back to where Kolivan and Keith were still talking, their bodies twisted to face the small crowd, who were still excitedly talking, head on.

“I’m sure it’s fine. Kolivan actually likes when we try to bond more as a unit, talking and trading training tips between ourselves.” Dacor explained. “He always talks about building trustful bonds and raising moral.”

“O-Oh.” Lance mumbled, still not convinced since Keith’s gaze at him seemed a little too nasty even from here. Was he annoyed that Lance was here? Kolivan did invite him, surely if Keith had explained his concerns to Kolivan himself then he would’ve been told.

“Do not worry, Lance.” Dacor suddenly tightened his grip in comfort for Lance, perhaps the two didn’t know each other well but it did actually manage to make Lance feel a little more at ease.

The group continued to chatter for a little longer, Lance beginning to fully relax into Dacor’s hold as he chatted idly with both Dacor and the rest of the blade who were around them.

“I would love to be flexible like that.” One blade member groaned. “That would really help on some of the missions I go on.”

“Flexibility is a valuable skill.” Dacor whispered, tapping his fingers against Lance’s waist suggestively.

Lance gulped but slowly rose to his tiptoes to whisper flirtatiously in Dacor’s ears, not even caring about the other blades present. “Well fine, I’ll admit, flexibility certainly comes in handy.”

“I bet it does.” The young blade coughed in embarrassment, now it was his turn to blush. 

Lance grinned triumphantly. “That reminds me. You owe me a favour.”

“Your wish is my command, Paladin.” Dacor pulled in closer, Lance usually would have felt uncomfortable what with all the other blade members watching them with curiosity, but he felt quite at ease here, even if Dacor was leaning so close that he could feel his breath against his skin. 

Lance was convinced that Dacor was going to make contact with his lips, his thoughts on the matter had partially escaped him but it didn’t matter anyway because not even a second later he felt a grip at his shoulder and he was suddenly yanked back until he was pressed against the body of another. 

Lance craned his neck to look at who had grabbed him in such a way and the first thing to enter his vision was jet black hair followed by an angry scowl, which could only belong to one person.

“Keith?”

Keith’s grip dropped from his shoulder before twisting him around to face him, the contact was hard and Lance winced almost immediately.

“Come with me.” Keith growled into his ear, taking a tight hold of wrist before pulling him away from the group and completely out of the training room, Dacor has no choice but to release his grip on Lance as we was so suddenly dragged away. 

“Keith? Where are we going?” Lance gulped in slight worry when the two reached the empty corridors. He hadn’t seen Keith act like this with him before so he wasn’t sure what to expect. Why was Keith angry with him? What had he done? Was it because Lance had done exactly what Keith had asked him not to? But Kolivan had invited him, he couldn’t exactly say no. 

“Shut up, Lance.”

“Keith, talk to me!”

A few minutes passed and before too long, Lance was roughly pushed through the door of his room, followed swiftly by Keith whose arms were trembling in anger at his sides.

“What the hell did you think you were doing?” Keith snapped.

Lance gasped on his words, he didn’t even know what to say. He had no idea what he’d even done. 

“I was just training. I was getting on and practicing.”

“No you were not!”

Lance growled, his tone turning bitter as he threw his hands up in defeat. “Oh, well then enlighten me, Keith, what the hell did I think I was going?”

“Talking to the other blades? Stopping them from training and flaunting in front of them like you were some god or something.”

“What are you even on about?” Lance snapped back in complete shock. “That’s seriously what you’re so pissed about?”

Keith took a threatening step forward, but Lance didn’t cower. He stood his ground as Keith continued to yell at him. “Obviously! You can’t just walk in there and just stop everyone from getting on with their training. They have missions coming up, they can’t afford that kind of distraction.” 

“Kolivan invited me to train there because the other training room was a bust. Also, I don’t even see why it’s any of your business. I didn’t even come near you once.”

“These are my teammates, their business is my business.” Keith snapped back immediately. “While you act like the usual you, you’re distracting them from getting on with their thing.”

“See, if you actually knew anything, you’d know that they were coming up to speak to me and ask about my workout.” Lance snarled and tried to make his way back to the door in order to leave, but Keith grabbed at his wrist again and refused to let go. 

“What about Dacor? I saw him. He clearly wasn’t just asking.” 

Lance blushed immediately, stepping back in surprise. “Okay, fine, yeah, I admit, Dacor was a lot more handsy than the others but it’s fine. I told him it was fine, so it’s not like I was uncomfortable and he was helping me with my shoulders.”

“He shouldn’t be helping you! He should be getting on with his stuff and you shouldn’t even be here! You should’ve just been a good paladin and managed to keep up with Pidge.”

Lance recoiled from the sharpness of Keith’s comment, like a knife to the chest, but he couldn’t stop the anger from consuming him, rising up until it felt like steam was bursting from his ears. 

“Fine!” Lance growled, caving into the argument. “Have what you want. I’m leaving. I’m done. You won’t see me again while I’m still here.”

Just as Lance went to make a swift exit, Keith grabbed at his wrist again and tugged him back to face him. 

“Lance. Why do you think Dacor is being so friendly to you? He wants something from you.” Keith snapped. “You shouldn’t trust him.”

“You’re being paranoid.” Lance rolled his eyes, slapping his wrist out of Keith’s hand. “Dacor was just being friendly. That’s all. It didn’t make me uncomfortable, it wasn’t creepy, and if anything, I spurred him on. He was nice to talk to, he helped me out a lot.”

“He’s using you!”

“How’d you get that idea?”

Keith froze, he fumbled over many words before finally he growled and stomped his foot like a petulant child. “I just know, okay? What? Don’t you trust me anymore?”

“What?! How dare you play that card with me? For such a stupid, petty, ridiculous reason!” Lance snarled, his voice breaking from shouting so loud, he went to leave again, but same as before, Keith grabbed at his wrist and held him in place. “I’m trying to do you a favour here, let me go!”

“No!”

“Keith, I mean it!” Lance tried so hard to flap his wrist from Keith’s grasp but he just held firm, not even slipping from his grip. 

Just as Lance was about to make yet another attempt to escape, he was suddenly yanked forward until his chest crashed against Keith’s hard. He tried to push back into his own space again but Keith snaked his arms around his waist and held him tight against him, not allowing him to budge. 

“Shut up, Lance.” Keith snarled before slamming his face forward, crashing his lips against Lance in a horrible fight of tongue and teeth that left Lance groaning. 

Lance didn’t relax into the kiss, but he definitely didn’t stop it at first either. Tangling his arms up and into Keith’s hair, pulling hard at it to show that he was still angry, but Keith just moaned against him, his lips were rough and harsh, the pressure he applied to Lance’s felt like it was already bruising. It didn’t feel right.

Lance felt Keith’s hand shift from his back, down to the curve of his ass, each hand taking one of Lance’s plump cheeks into them before squeezing hard, positioning Lance between his legs so Keith could grind one of his thighs against Lance’s growing interest.

“I can feel you through these leggings.” Keith purred. “I know there aren’t any boxer shorts kept in here. So here’s the question of the universe. Does Lance McClain flip his underwear or does he go commando?”

“Was that supposed to sound sexy?” Lance grunted, just because him and Keith were kissing it definitely did not mean he wasn’t angry with him. They’d done this dozens of time, angry kissing was their staple move.

“I’ll say anything as long as it gets you out of those pants faster.” Keith growled, grabbing hard at Lance’s rump and grinding him against his thigh. “What do you wanna hear, Lance?”

“I wanna hear why you’ve been acting like an asshole recently.”

Keith leaned back to give Lance a deadpan expression. “Don’t ruin this, Lance.”

“No I mean it, why do you hate me one second and then want in my pants the next?”

“Because this is how we’ve always been. What did you miss the memo?” Keith tried to make a way for Lance’s lips again but Lance immediately pushed him back, hard, so Keith had to take a few steps back. 

Keith went to reach out but Lance immediately pulled away, out of Keith’s reach.

“What? Suddenly you don’t want to?” Keith grumbled, looking down at his feet in frustration. “What's different now to the hundreds of other times we’ve done this?” 

“You, Keith.” Lance growled, pushing back again as Keith tried to step into his space once more. “You’ve changed so much since coming to the blades, and not for the better! You’re sneaky and secretive and it’s almost like your already short temper is just non-existent now! You’re just always angry!”

“I’m always angry at you!”

“But why?!” Lance snapped. “I’m trying my best, Keith, I did as you said. I didn’t wander around. I tried to keep up with the training after Kolivan had invited me, I didn’t go anywhere except the places you told me. I have not bothered you, or got in your way, I don’t understand why you’re making this into a fight!”

“Because you’re being stupid!”

“No I am not!” Lance snapped. “This is the same again and again. You keep causing arguments when they don’t need to be arguments. Everything is a fight with you. I can’t keep doing this, Keith, it’s too hard. We need to fix this.”

“Stop acting like a ridiculous moron all the time, stop getting in my way, and then maybe we’ll be able to find some peace.”

Lance growled at the top of his lungs, he was clearly not getting anywhere with this, and his throat was beginning to hurt from shouting. “Fine. Fine. You know what? I’ll do just that. Now leave Keith, I don’t want to continue this anymore.”

Keith opened his mouth to speak but Lance entirely turned his back on him, waiting for Keith to leave. With another growl and a swift kick at the drawers, Keith left the room and slammed the door shut behind him. 


	5. Chapter Five

Lance didn’t leave his room the next day at all, not even to eat. He stayed inside with the door locked and simply slept or laid in bed daydreaming for over 24 hours before finally getting up the morning of the castle’s expected arrival. 

Dacor was kind enough to pop around in the evening before and brought some food he’d managed to sneak from the cantine, though how he knew where Lance was sleeping was a mystery to him. Still, he was grateful, and happily chowed on the meat broth filled with… things that were seemingly edible. 

“I’m sorry if I made problems between you and your fellow paladin, Lance.” Dacor whispered. “Keith has never shown much care for what his fellow blades have done in training before, I never thought he would pull you away like that.”

“It’s fine, Dacor.” Lance whispered as he had finished up his broth. “Keith and I don’t have the most stable of relationships the majority of the time. It’s not your fault. Keith and I just don’t get along.”

“That is sad to hear. Especially that he is a paladin like you, from legends I heard from my mother growing up, the bond between paladins were much like the bonds between their lions. Strong and unbreakable.”

“I’m afraid not even that is true.” Lance whispered. “But thank you, Dacor. For bringing me the food and giving me some company for a bit. You must be busy so I won’t keep you from your other responsibilities.”

“No thank you Lance, you are truly a pleasure to be in the company of.”

Not long after that, Dacor left being kind enough to take Lance’s empty food bowl and spoon with him, leaving Lance completely alone once more.

Immediately, he crawled back under the covers of his blanket and sank his head back into his pillow. Allowing his dark thoughts and insecurities to scutter around his brains until he finally drifted off into a restless sleep once more.

When he woke, the morning cycle had began and the lights in his room were shining mixtures of bright blues and yellows. Lance rose from his little cocoon slowly and began pacing around the room, changing into his own clothing and paladin armour then leaving the shirts he’d been wearing these last couple of days in a pile by the door to take with him when he left.

He swiped the forgotten hairbrush across his brown locks, due to his lack of self care these last couple of days, his natural curls were starting to come through, it didn’t help that Lance’s hair was in dire need of a cut as well. After brushing enough that all of the knots and major curls were flattened down into waves against his head, he placed the brush down and grabbed his dirty t-shirts from the corner and swiftly exited the room.

He walked towards the canteen where a kind blade member he’d met the other day in training was kind enough to point him to a laundry shoot in the corner of the room where Lance could dump the clothes. After following the instructions, Lance headed towards the food stall and grabbed himself a bowl of food goo from one of the self-administering pumps that Kolivan had told him about, rather than risk eating carpet again.

When he sat down to eat, he was surprised by just how bland the food goo was, it had been a while since Lance had eaten goo that Hunk hadn’t tampered with in some way to improve the flavour and honestly, even though those flavours were wacky at times, Lance would give anything to have a bowl of it right now. 

Lance ate in silence, none of the blade members paid him any mind thankfully, before suddenly a tall blade member with his mask on entered the canteen, caught sight of Lance and made a B-line right towards him. 

Lance looked up from his food just as the blade member uncovered his mask, revealing a blank faced Kolivan staring down at him.

“Master Lance, forgive me, I went to search for you in the room you were given but couldn’t find you. We’ve received word from the castle, they are docking into the base as we speak. Keith is waiting to ready their arrival.”

“Oh yes. Thank you, Kolivan.” Lance perked up immediately, choosing to leave the rest of his food after abandoning his things in one of the wash boxes left at the end of his table. “I’ll follow you.”

Kolivan nodded swiftly and the two quickly made their way to the hanger where Lance had arrived just two days prior. When he arrived, Allura and Coran had already exited the ship and were talking happily to an… equally happy to see them, Keith.

When Allura caught eyes of Lance she smiled wider and parted the conversation in order to meet Lance halfway.

“Lance!” She grinned, before wrapping the red paladin up in a tight hug. “My apologies that we are so late, we stopped by the rebel base on our way in order to collect Pidge.”

“It’s alright.” Lance smiled back, nevertheless happy to see Allura again even if it had been a few days. “I’m glad you got here safe.”

“It seems my blades are as happy as well.” Kolivan grunted, seemingly embarrassed. 

A crowd of marmora blades had gathered around the front of the castleship and Lance could see them all making conversation with different members of the paladins, Allura swiftly returned back to her conversation with Keith and Coran, as well as other blade who had joined in. Pidge was stood by the side of the castle, a large crowd of marmora around her, and if Lance stood on his tiptoes, he could just about see the white of Shiro’s hair through another even larger crowd of blade members.

But, there was no sight of-

“Lance!” Hunk suddenly broke through the crowd, coming straight towards him at top speed, pushing his way past blades who were more than a foot or two taller than him.

Lance couldn’t help himself, he broke off from Kolivan immediately and sprinted forwards and into his best friends arms, jumping up to circle his legs around Hunk’s waist.

“It’s only been three days but it has felt like years have been taken off my life.” Hunk cried, wrapping his arms tightly around Lance, leave it to Hunk to make Lance feel immediately better after a rough couple of days.

“I missed you too, buddy.” Lance pressed his face into Hunk’s neck. “I really did.”

“You have to tell me everything about what you did, even though we’ve visited the blade’s headquarters a few times now, we’ve never had a chance to see what their daily routine is like, not like you have Lance.” Hunk rushed out in one breath. “I need you tell me every dirty little detail this place has.”

Lance couldn’t help but laugh. “Of course, man, I’ll tell you all the goss and tea that this place has to offer. Sneak preview: did you know that every marmora is gifted with a tiara that they have to wear during mealtimes.”

“No way, that’s not true!”

“You’re right, it’s not.” Lance laughed.

“Lance.” Shiro’s booming father voice suddenly boomed out interrupting Hunk and Lance’s moment. Lance looked to Shiro who had stepped out through the crowd and was staring at Lance in a way that almost frightened him down to his bones.

Lance jumped down from Hunk’s body and immediately walked towards his commanding officer, his head looking down at the floor in shame as he walked. 

He felt eyes turn towards him as he walked, increasing his anxiety as well as his embarrassment as he finally stopped in front of Shiro. 

“Shiro, I-”

“Don’t try to make excuses.” Shiro interrupted. “What you did was reckless and irresponsible? You are a paladin of voltron. That responsibility should come before all else and you failed.”

Lance nodded his head, he wasn’t going to argue, it wouldn’t have got him anywhere, besides he felt like a child being told of by their parent and that was too mortifying in front of all these people to find words anyway.

“And because of your mistake, the blade were forced to caretake for you and put themselves out just because of something that was your fault. I hope you have thanked each and everyone of them properly for what they have done for you.”

“Of course, Shiro.”

“And when we get back on the castle, I am doubling your current training, the mistake you made was rookie and shouldn’t ever have happened. This training increase will take place until I deem you responsible enough to bring it back down again. Am I understood, Lance?”

“Yes, sir.” Lance whispered.

“I can’t hear you, Lance.”

Lance looked up through his lashes, his face bright red. “Yes, sir!”

Shiro nodded his head and immediately turned around and heading towards Allura and Kolivan who were now stood separate from everyone else and talking quietly. 

Lance could feel the frustration picking at him, he wanted so desperately to shout, to yell that it was an accident, that it wasn’t his fault, that he was doing what he thought was right. But no words came out, they stayed inside him, causing him to seethe and shake on the spot.

“Lance?” Hunk’s soothing voice suddenly called from beside him. “You okay, buddy?”

“I’m going to wait on the ship. I’ve already said my goodbyes.” Lance lied, only wanting to get away from this crowd, away from his shame. He walked on without waiting for Hunk’s reply and didn’t stop walking until he was inside the castle, wearing through the main corridor and into the main hall. 

Lance didn’t stop as he cut across the large hall, making a line straight towards the steps which he knew would carry him towards his room, but before he could make it, he heard footsteps echoing from behind him and a voice that followed.

“Paladin?” The voice echoed.

Lance looked back, he was utterly exhausted, all he wanted to do was crawl into his little shame protector called his bedroom and never wake up again. But, he was surprised by the voice that had called out to him and felt his spirit rise if only slightly.

“Oh, Dacor?” Lance blinked, completely surprised, taking in the appearance of the young blade, his face was bright red and he looked slightly out of breath. “I’m sorry, I assumed you were busy so didn’t think to look for you.”

“I saw how your commanding officer treated you back there so I understand why you returned back to your ship rather than wait for the others to return. But I had to speak with you one more time before you leave.”

Lance walked back towards Dacor who was making his way towards him, the two stopping a little closer to each other than most people would find regular in this situation.

“Don’t worry, Allura will probably have us visit again soon, and who knows, it's a small universe, maybe we’ll bump into each other in the space mall or something.” Lance chuckled, trying to mask the pain he was currently feeling. 

“I fear our reality may not be the one where that happens.” Dacor smiled sadly. 

“Then, we shall meet in another reality.”

“In another reality.” Dacor agreed. “I will have to come and visit you myself though, young paladin, a beauty such as yours is too pure that I fear I will not be able to stay away for long.”

“Again with the compliments.” Lance laughed, allowing Dacor to take a tight hold of his hand. “You really are just full of them, aren’t you?”

“Paladin, Lance.” Dacor smiled sweetly, bending into a bow before Lance. “It was the greatest pleasure to meet you, it saddens me deeply that you must depart already.”

Dacor placed another soft kiss on Lance’s hand, just as had when the two had met, but this time Lance didn’t pull away. He smiled down at the handsome blade as he kissed the hand once, twice, three times before standing back up to his feet, his lilac cheeks turning more a shade of red. 

“Me too, Dacor. But I will see you again… Soon. You’ll have to teach me how you fixed my shoulders so easily.” 

“It would be an honour, Lance.” Dacor obviously made a move to wrap his arms around Lance, but stopped short and placed his hands back down to his sides. “My apologies, there is still much we don’t know about each other, I understand that we’re not close enough to be embracing one another. I just momentarily forgot.”

“It’s cool.” Lance beamed, taking the initiative and lifting his arms to hug around Dacor’s neck, it was difficult but Dacor made it easier when he wrapped his own arms around Lance’s waist and lifted him into the air so that Lance was able to hold on more comfortably. “You are too strong.”

“It is you who is fragile, young paladin.” Dacor chuckled in return.

Dacor lowered Lance back to the floor but rather than separate completely, he took a hold of Lance’s small hands and the two just stared into each other’s eyes for just a moment. Lance getting entirely lost in the kindness he’d found their before.

“Lance.” A voice suddenly snarled through the comfortable silence. “I need to talk to you.”

Keith stood at the door of the main hall, glaring right at the happy pair who had been talking comfortably until now. 

“Until we meet again, Lance.” Dacor nodded with another bow before making a swift exit from the hall, allowing Keith to step forward at a quick pace towards Lance.

Knowing what the conversation was likely going to end in (an argument), Lance walked towards the hall steps and sat down at the bottom, waiting for Keith to stand above him and yell down at him. 

“Alright. Lay it on me.” Lance sighed. “What have I done wrong now?”

“I told you not to trust him.” Keith growled softly, sitting a meter from away from Lance on the steps.

“And I told you, you were being ridiculous.”

“I’m not being ridiculous, this is my life. I know what these people are like. I know the type of people they are. People like this, like me, and people like you should stay far away from each other.”

“I don’t even see why you’re so angry. I’ve done as you asked me to. I haven’t contacted you at all while you’ve been here. I haven’t forced myself into this life of yours, no matter how much I’ve wanted to argue with you. Shout at you when you’ve been reckless, yell at you when you’ve made the wrong choice.”

“This was my decision, Lance!” Keith snapped. “Mine and mine alone, it’s got nothing to do with you, this is where I belong, and you don’t belong here. You belong with the paladins, doing your duty against Zarkon as I am doing mine. You can’t just drop here and mess up everything for me.”

“You’re still being ridiculous.” Lance growled, his anger from before was back again in full force. He didn’t understand why Keith was being like this, why Keith continued to push him away with everything he had. This was even worse than before when they first found the lions.

“What happened to us?” Lance dropped his head to the ground, he couldn't keep doing this. Couldn’t keep arguing with Keith all the time.

As the seconds passed, Lance brain began to wander and he couldn’t stop himself from thinking back to before this. Before Keith had left voltron. Left him.

_ “Lance.” _

_ “Mmh.” Lance mumbled, his vision dark from his eyes being shut, he was laid down on his stomach with no blanket covering him. The cold air rushing up and down his naked body, but he didn’t feel cold at all. _

_ “I’m going to join the blades. Permanently.” Keith suddenly spoke up, Lance could feel Keith’s fingers lightly tracing lines across Lance’s shoulder blades and down his spine, like feather kisses on his skin. _

_ “Why would you do that?” Lance purred tiredly into the pillow, his post orgasm haze knocking everything out him. “Your place is here, isn’t it? With us.” _

_ “Now that Shiro’s back, voltron doesn’t need me as it’s leader all the time anymore. I’ll still come back when we need to form voltron but I want to explore this part of myself. Shiro can hold the fort while I’m gone, he’s been doing it since the beginning. I’m sure he’s qualified. That way I can go on more missions, train more with the blade.” _

_ “But wouldn't that be hard for you? Splitting yourself between two places.” Lance turned around onto his back to face Keith who was sat up in bed, staring down at Lance with an unusual blank canvas expression on his face.  _

_ “I already do that and, you’re right, it is hard. But I want to be more serious with the blades.” Keith whispered. “They’re the key to figuring out my past, who my family are. I can’t keep living knowing nothing about myself, Lance.” _

_ “Nothing?” Lance frowned, lifting his body until he was positioned laying between Keith’s bare legs. His head resting against his stomach. “That can’t possibly be true.” _

_ “It is.” _

_ “Well… I find it unfortunate that I know more about you than you do then.” Lance gently blew cold hair on Keith’s skin. _

_ Keith shivered. “Or really? You know me, do you?” _

_ “For example, I know that your most ticklish spot is your waist.” Lance chuckled, jabbing at Keith’s waist which immediately shocked him and he let out a small squeal of surprise. “I know that you hate having hair on your body, so you shave literally every single part of yourself.” _

_ Lance proved his point by lowering his arm down to Keith’s ankle and running it up, past the knee up to the upper thigh, meeting nothing but smooth, hairless skin.  _

_ “I also know that when I kiss your thighs like this-” Lance smirked evilly as he lowered his face down until his cheek pressed against one of Keith’s thigh, which was immediately met by a soft whimper escaping from Keith’s lips. “You make this cute little kitten sound that makes me want to do it again.” _

_ So Lance did it again, then he licked at the skin, then he wrapped his teeth around the flesh and gently bit down until a loud gasp fell from Keith’s lips.  _

_ “Lance, really? We just did it.” Keith gasped but he didn’t sound like he was asking Lance to stop. _

_ “Finally, I know-” Lance completely ignored Keith’s words. “That when I take you in my mouth, you can’t control your hips from stuttering and moving, you try to hold yourself but you just can’t stop, you’re torn from holding yourself down or running your fingers through your mullet, giving yourself up to the pleasure, then when you’re close to finishing, you fist your hands into my hair and fully thrust into my mouth, because you know that I can take it.” _

_ “You can take it.” Keith repeated like a broken record player as Lance suddenly proved his points by taking Keith’s entirety into his mouth, bobbing his head slowly, resting his hands under his chest not to stop Keith from doing his little push ups into the air with his hips. _

_ A few minutes passed like that, the sounds coming from Keith’s mouth like songs of the angels, when suddenly he increased in volume and did exactly as Lance had told him, fisting his fingers through Lance’s hair, trying so hard not to pull but unable to stop himself from pushing Lance’s head down further into his lap. _

_ “Lance, Lance.” Keith chanted like a mantra, cantering upwards with more ferocity as his end grew closer and closer until finally he pushed himself up as high as he could and Lance tasted the familiar feeling of Keith coming undone down his throat.  _

_ “Told you.” Lance smirked, swallowing everything Keith gave him, before resting his head on Keith’s thigh again for just a moment. “Say what you want, chico lindo, but I definitely know at least a few things about you.” _

_ Lance rose up from his laying position and crawled properly into Keith’s lap, perching his ass down on Keith’s naked thighs and leaning forward so their sweaty chests swiped against each other and Lance was able to tuck his head into Keith’s neck. _

_ “Okay but joking aside, Lance.” Keith whispered, as Lance pressed a couple of kisses in to Keith’s neck. “What do you think… about the blade stuff?” _

_ “I think you should do what makes you happy, Keith.” Lance purred. “If joining the blades and finding out more about your heritage makes you happy, then what kind of friend would I be if I tried to stop you? I respect your decisions, and trust your judgement, and when you return to us, I’ll be waiting for you, here. Naked. In your bed.” _

_ Keith’s breath caught in his throat for a second before he finally reached up and grabbed Lance by the back of his neck, pulling him into him till their lips met in a fiery heat that burned them both. _

_ “You’re amazing.” Keith whispered through their lips.  _

_ Lance pulled away with a laugh. “You’re bias because I just had your dick in my mouth.” _

_ “Shut up, Lance.” _

_ Lance smiled, pushing his lips against Keith’s again, feeling like the universe couldn’t even stop him now. _

“Lance.” A voice shouted. “Lance?”

“Huh?” Lance eloquently grunted as he was suddenly ripped from his memories.

“You’re not even listening to a word I’m saying, are you?” Keith growled. “Seriously, Lance? Are you kidding me?”

Lance eyes zoned back into his current surroundings and returned back to Keith who had since Lance’s daydreaming, stood up to his feet and was towering down at Lance.

“I’m sorry. You’re not exactly the most interesting person to listen to.” Lance snapped back venomously. “Or talk to in general.”

“That’s because you’re an idiot! You say that I’m the one who’s changed and that I’m the one who’s causing problems where there aren’t any but look what your doing? You just have to take a crack at everything don’t you?!”

“Well can you blame me?” Lance cried out back, jumping up to his feet as well. “You just make everything difficult for both of us.”

“There is no us, Lance!” Keith snapped back. “I’ve already made that as clear to you as I possibly can, it’s not possible, you’re on the castle, and I’m with the blades. We’re fighting a war. I don’t have time to be playing teenage melodrama with you. I don’t feel that way about you and I never have. Just get that into your head already.”

“Okay, Keith, I get it!” Lance snarled. “I get it now. I’ll make you a promise, the next time we meet. There will be nothing between us. We’re just Keith and Lance, rivals and enemies, and I will hold no positive regard for you whatsoever. All these months of working to trust each other on the battlefield, gone. It’ll be like when we saved Shiro all over again, nothing but anger.”

“Good. Be sure you do.”

Without another word, Keith turned on his heel and stomped out of the great hall, not even granting Lance a second look.

Lance could feel the tears begin to prick at his eyes again but before they could fall he quickly turned on his heel and ran up the stairs of the great hall and through the castle, weaving through corridors and past the training room and the dining hall, until he reached his room.

Then, without any of the elegance and beauty Dacor was sure Lance possesed, Lance threw off every piece of his paladin armour, throwing them at different walls in the room. Throwing his helmet with all his might at the floor, not even feeling satisfied with the angry crunch sound it made before rolling across the floor where it stopped in the corner of the room.

Lance could hear the disappointed growl from red in his ears but he immediately covered them and called out for the beast to be quiet, to which thankfully, she was.

Lance immediately jumped into bed and threw his blankets over his body, covering every inch of himself including his head till he was buried between his matress and the blankets with no peeping eyes having a chance to see him.

It was only then, that Lance allowed himself to cry.


	6. Chapter Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was honestly my favourite chapter to write just because Allura and Pidge are my favourite characters to write for.  
> Plus most of this chapter is just a bad character writing mess and I love it.

Time passed a lot slower in the castle, especially when there was nothing to do. Since Lance had pretty much been put on the naughty step by Shiro, he’d been barred from doing any more solo missions or tagalongs until further notice. 

So that just left him wandering the castle alone. Pidge and Hunk were probably working on some new science experiment down in Pidge’s Hangar, Shiro was most likely with Lotor going over possible missions for the paladins to undertake. Lance already knew that Coran had been pretty much glued to the teleduv these last few days just trying to find something that would make it return back to how it used to be and Allura… Well, Lance didn’t actually know where Allura would be.

Perhaps with Shiro? Or maybe with Coran? Or the Mice?

Lance sighed as he made his way up to the bridge. If she wasn’t with anyone she’d likely be in the bridge and since Lance didn’t really feel like interrupting anyone else, he supposed that the only person he could pester right now that wouldn’t genuinely get angry with him was Allura.

Sure enough, when Lance entered the large bridge. Allura was there. But, rather than stood in her usual place at the controls, she was sat in Shiro’s control chair, her legs draped over the side as she casually scrolled through something on the screens. 

“Allura.”

The princess almost jumped from her seat in her surprise, but as she turned to look at the owner of the voice that had surprised her, her face morphed into one of relief.

“Oh, Lance. It’s you. How are you feeling?”

“...” Lance opened his mouth to speak but couldn’t find the words to say so closed his mouth again and looked to the floor in discomfort. 

Allura sighed. “I feel much the same.”

“What’s the matter, princess?” Lance gulped, finding his words only when it were for the princess’ well-being.

“My shoulders are just a little sore from having to carry a third of the universe on them.” Allura chuckled, trying to mask the stress lines that Lance could see in her forehead from here. 

“Fancy a little break?” Lance sighed as he made his way over to her, kneeling by the bottom of her seat. “I’ve been told my shoulders are quite stiff, perhaps that’ll allow me to keep tight hold of that universe for you while you rest.”

Allura let out an amused huff of air before turning onto her side so she could rest out arms over Lance’s shoulders. “I would absolutely take you up on that offer, Lance, if it were possible.”

“I can make it possible.” Lance mumbled stubbornly. 

“So what is it that has you so down, Lance?”

“Boy problems.” Lance scoffed disdainfully. “Fancy listening to me whine for a couple of hours, I might throw in some self-pity and even a little crying heart-to-heart if you ask nicely.”

“Of course. Am I right in assuming this boy causing problems is a certain blade of marmora that you may or may not have seen during your stay there?”

“You might be right in your assumption.”

“Perhaps we should talk about this in my room.” Allura mumbled quietly. “Go to the kitchen and grab some snacks while I shut the computer down and then we’ll meet in my room. That way we can sit and talk in there, it’ll probably be more comfortable.”

Lance nodded his head and left first, pacing towards the kitchen where he grabbed some random food packets from the cupboards, most of which he didn’t know the contents of but recognised from packets he’d seen Allura take in the past to snack on.

He also took the liberty of grabbing some water pouches before making his way across the castle all the way to the grand suite where Allura slept. He briskly knocked on the door before entering and smiled as Allura’s sweet face welcomed him in and took some of the things from his arms and gently placed them down on her table. 

“So.” Allura sighed, the two walking towards the bed, Allura perched on the end while Lance rathered to sit down on the floor, his back to Allura as he rested between her thighs. Allura immediately brushed her fingers through Lance’s hair and began to pull at the knots that had gathered in there. “Your hair is getting rather long, I didn’t know your hair was curly.”

“I know.” Lance grumbled unhappily. “Only the back really gets curly though. I need to cut it soon or else I’ll end up with a stupid looking mullet.”

“I thought you liked stupid looking mullets.” Allura suddenly chuckled. “Or at least, that’s what I can only assume giving your feelings towards Keith.”

“I don’t have  _ feelings _ towards, Keith.”

Allura snorted. “Then what would you call it?”

“I don’t know. I just… I like being around him. Even though he can be quite closed off sometimes, and sometimes he’s a little blunt with his words. His temper is shorter than how he looks standing next to Kolivan. He’s rude. Pessimistic. Argumentative… But, he’s also giving, and he knows what to say in those serious moments, he owns up to his mistakes and tries to fix his errors in judgment. He’s capable of being so soft, and sweet and so adorable sometimes when I look at him I feel like I’m going to drop dead from cuteness overload and-”

“No, I see what you mean now.” Allura interrupted Lance barely half way through his monologue. “You don’t have feelings for him at all. It sounds like your full force in love with him.”

“Me? Lance McClain? In love? Apologies, princess, but I don’t think so.” Lance scoffed. 

“Are you sure?”

“Of course not! He’s my friend, all I want is what’s best for him. To know that he’s safe and happy and that he’s not hiding his true feelings in order to prevent others from worrying about him. I just want him to be loved and know that he’s loved.” Lance explained, thinking through every thought and emotion he’s ever felt towards Keith, it would be ridiculous for Lance to ignore the fact that even thinking about Keith like this was brightening up Lance’s mood, making him feel more relaxed and calm. “Okay… Maybe. Maybe a little. Maybe I’m just a little bit in love with him. Hypothetically. But let’s say that I am, hypothetically, in full force love with him. I’d never force him to be with me. I just… wish we could go back to how we used to be.”

“I know what you mean, Lance, love is definitely not an easy thing to keep a hold of.”

Lance looked up towards the princess in surprise. “Princess, you’ve been through this before? How did it end?”

“I’m afraid I can’t tell you how it ends. I still deal with this every day, a love that I once had and yet cannot seem to get back.” Lance noticed the sadness that was held in Allura’s eyes, her usual brightness seemed to have gone out as she sighed wistfully while running her fingers through Lance’s hair.

“You mean Shiro, don’t you?”

“... Before the battle of Zarkon, Shiro and I seemed to understand each other and held a deep positive regard for one another. You know me Lance, I’m not one to kiss and tell, but the moments between Shiro and I were like nothing I experienced before, either that or they were feelings I hadn’t felt for a long time.”

“Like… Home.”

“That is correct.” Allura whimpered in agreement. “But, after we lost him, I did everything in my power to find him while also fighting a war, while also being a princess for a dead race, while also becoming a paladin of the universe’s greatest defender. I had little time to grieve but I managed where I could… But then he returned to us.”

“I could tell how happy you were when he was back on the ship. I should’ve known things were more serious between you two.” Lance smiled wistfully, thinking back to the time when Shiro had returned. Everyone had been in the highest of spirits, though it had been short lived. 

“I should’ve known about you and Keith, I thought at the time that the two of you sneaking away was a little strange but never thought more of it than that.”

Lance tensed and immediately blushed beet red as he thought back to the couple of days following Shiro’s return. Keith pulled him through almost every room in the castle just so that the two of them could share a blissful moment alone. If he thought about it, Lance could still feel his fingers running through Keith’s hair as Keith pulled tight at his jacket just to pull him that little bit closer so that there was no distance between them, just the two of them, smiling and happy. 

“But- it didn’t last.” Lance smiled sadly. 

“No. On both sides. I tried to speak to Shiro alone multiple times after his return but he always found something to separate us. Eventually, I cornered him and asked him why he’d been avoiding me. He told me he was trying to spare my feelings, he thought that we couldn’t be together anymore as it put the team at risk. That our feelings would cloud our judgement. So ever since we have kept each other at arm’s length and I truly believe it is one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.”

“Harder than fighting the galra?”

“Immensely. At least with the galra I know where I stand most of the time, against them, but with Shiro… Sometimes he gives me that soft smile of his to tell me he’s proud of me, so soft that he doesn’t even need to say it and I’m lost. I don’t know where I stand with him. He is my greatest enigma.” 

“Men.” Lance humphed, only because he was unsure of what else to say. “Why have they got to be like this? Is their like a men’s rulebook where one of the rules is, if something starts to get too serious, you pull away. Oh but not completely pull away. Pull away just enough that the other party lives a mix of constant torment and bliss when around them.”

“And another rule is to over apologise. Apologise but never explain what for. Never be honest about their true feelings, just hide them away and expect the other person to guess what they’re thinking.”

Allura sighed a final time before removing her fingers from Lance’s hair and laying back down onto her bed. Lance watched her for a moment as she raised her hands to her forehead and rubbed at it, even from this angle Lance could see every conflicting emotion running across her face.

Not really feeling like they could talk from this angle, Lance stood up to his feet and perched beside Allura on the end of the bed, laying down on his back with his legs dangling from the side the same as she did. 

“So, I assume this has been going on a while. What did the boy do while you were there?”

“He just-” Lance gulped, feeling tears already prick at his eyes. “He just made everything an issue. Nothing was easy. Nothing was simple. Everything I did, he managed to find an issue with it and obviously, I didn’t want to get in his space but it didn’t seem to matter. Everything I did was wrong.”

“I feel like I need a bit of backstory. When did this thing between you and Keith even start?”

Lance thought for a moment, thinking back to all those months ago. Keith and him were arguing, as per usual, in the training room. They were training together in hand-to-hand combat but Keith was being a little too rough, using his skill over Lance to easily overpower him and shove him into the floor. Lance had managed to get the upper hand over him and flipped them over so Keith was on his back and Lance was above him, the two stared at each other for just a moment, panting and gulping due to lack of breath. One moment they were like that, and then the next they were shoving into each other. Kissing each other rough and so uncoordinated that both grunted in slight pain from the treatment. But they didn’t stop. They didn’t stop until they were in Keith’s room, Lance flipped onto his stomach, angry but satisfied with Keith sleeping on his back. Both too exhausted to move or even talk.

“It was around the same time Keith found out about his heritage. He was going through a lot of stress, what with learning he was an alien, you weren’t talking to him, he felt like the entire team was avoiding him and we just kinda… fell together.”

“I see. So, when did the issues between you and Keith start?”

Lance gulped. “Well, they’ve always been there. Keith and I were never official, we just kinda started out using each other to relieve stress but then that would become sleeping together, talking more, y’know pillow talk and the like and it was good. There was no pressure. We just enjoyed each other. When he decided to join to blades for more training we were still pretty okay, it was hard because we all missed him and he started spending less and less time here. I didn’t want to nag him about it but his duty was here with us.”

“I remember you being a lot more quiet around that time. Was it that heavy on your mind?”

“It was.” Lance sighed. “Then, Shiro flew the black lion again and all of a sudden it was like Keith hated me, like I was the person in his way. Which I suppose I was since I had red, but I would’ve stepped down if it meant Keith remaining a paladin, I wouldn’t have thrown a fit at all for him. But… He didn’t even tell me that he was leaving voltron completely.”

“He didn’t?”

“Not privately. When I found out was the same time he told the rest of you. I just- I thought I was worth more than that. I tried to talk to him about it before he left, I went to his room but he just… It’s like he wasn’t the same anymore. Like he’d flipped a switch and felt nothing for me except hatred and anger.”

“I’m sure that’s not true.”

“Trust me, Allura.” Lance held up his hand to stop her. “I’ve only come to that conclusion after dozens of attempt to reconcile with him, trying to cling on to at least the friendship we have built. But he isn’t interested. He sees me more as a nuisance than anything else.”

“Have you spoken to him about this?”

“I’ve tried.” Lance grumbled, throwing his hands on the mattress behind him in a nice dramatic fashion. “He either changes the subject, starts a fight, or makes me out like I’m being to needy or whiney and yeah, maybe I am both of those things but it’s only because Keith changes his mind so often. One minute we’re fighting but then the next he’s trying to pull my top over my head. When he left for the blade completely, on his visits back he would come to my room and we’d fall into bed together again, at that time it was fine, he would tell me that he needed to relieve some stress and I’d tell him that he was fit so it was fine by me. We’d mess around, we’d joke, we’d laugh, but when we weren’t alone he was so indifferent to me, like everything was just a big joke to him. Then, after that battle when Lotor came into the picture even that’s gone. He just… He refuses to talk to me, we don’t get on like we used to. It’s not just about sex or making out, I just want him to be my mullet-headed loser friend again.”

Lance felt the tears long before they actually arrived, but he knew there was nothing he could do to stop them, so he just allowed them to cascade down his cheeks, his cheeks immediately puffing bright red and his voice jumping three octaves higher as he spoke.

“If I knew-” Lance snorted to trying and save the snot that was about to leak from his nose. “If I knew that this would’ve happened, I never would’ve slept with him in the first place, I would’ve stopped myself from falling in love with him. I would’ve made sure that first and foremost, we were teammates before all else.”

“As would I. I should’ve known not to fall for someone on the battlefield.” Allura suddenly whimpered, Lance caught the tail end of a solitary tear run down her cheek and drop from her chin.

“We’re going to get over them.” Lance declared. “We are going to do it and then me and you, we will never fall in love again. Who needs it? Who needs love?”

“Not I.”

“Not I.”

The two twisted over and cuddled into one another, just allowing themselves to cry and be held, to be sad, and to feel loss even if perhaps they didn’t understand what loss truly meant. 

For a while, they laid like that, sniffling and whimpering into one another before suddenly there was a slow, quiet knock at the door.

Allura shot up to a seated position quickly, wiping her eyes and brushing the messy bits of her hair down before clearing her throat. A princess before all all.

“Come in?”

“I heard crying but it’s not me. What’s going on?” Hunk’s beautiful head suddenly popped through the gap in the door.

“Oh. Hunk. It’s you.” Allura smiled sweetly, wiping at her eyes. Returning back to her proper self immediately, no need for the princess facade.

“And me!” Pidge’s voice suddenly called through, Lance looked over just as Hunk suddenly fell into the room, following by a proud looking Pidge behind him. “We were wondering where you two were.”

“Is everything okay?” Hunk mumbled, picking himself back up from his stumble.

“Yeah.” Lance sighed. “We’ve just been talking about the cruel yet tempting mistress that is Love.”

“Oh. Love is hard, man.” Hunk pouted. “My girl is all the other way across the galaxy and she doesn’t even have a space phone. What if she doesn’t like me anymore? What if she meets some nice looking boulder who calls her all the right things and takes her all the right places? Why am I destined to be alone?”

“Feel free to join the dogpile, buddy.” Lance nodded sadly at his best friend. “We have snacks and water to replenish our energy and hydration that we will lose through crying.”

“Allura, you too?” Pidge cocked her head in confusion.

Allura nodded.

“Shiro?”

Another nod.

“Obvious.”

“Love is so hard. Why does it have to hurt so much?” Lance whined, kicking his feet out like a tantruming child. “What did I ever do?”

“Was I a cruel being in a past life that now the ancients believe that I am owed some suffering as penance for my crime?” Allura thankfully joined in on the, sure, maybe a little immature, but no less valid self-pity party.

“This is in no way relevant to my life. Totally unrelatable.” Pidge grumbled. “I can’t understand what any of you are feeling.”

Lance snorted. “Think back to when beamer betrayed you, you’ll probably be close to where we are.”

“That bad?” Pidge whimpered. “Okay. I’m willing to drop my robot like personality for a couple of hours if you guys want hugs and feel-better time.”

“Always.” Hunk answered for her, suddenly sweeping the young girl up into his arms and squeezing her tight as he made his way over to the bed. Without much of a warning for Pidge, he suddenly threw the poor girl through the air till she dropped into the large queen-sized bed with a thump. 

Hunk quickly joined her after grabbing some of the water and food from Alluras desk and leave it in the middle before climbing in on to the bed, the four paladins cuddled up in an almost wolf-pack fashion, resting against one another in strange ways that would normally have been uncomfortable but like this, surrounded by his friend’s warmth and care, he could feel nothing but safe and loved.

For a while, they just laid like that, none of them even really wanting to speak, just wanting to enjoy each other's company. It had felt like months since they’d done this. Just been together. The young paladins of voltron, still all children in a way, feeling sad because they weren’t being loved the way they wanted to.

Some time passed, Lance wasn’t even sure how long before suddenly the group began to shift and move until a voice spoke up from the dogpile.

“Okay. Allura have you ever heard of snog, marry, or avoid?” Hunk grumbled, twisting over onto his belly, Lance lifted his leg to better accompany Hunk’s movement before resting it back down again on his rump.

“I have heard of all three of those things.”

“He means the game.” Pidge snorted. “Someone says three random names in existence and you have to choose one of them to snog, one of them to marry, and one of them to avoid.”

Allura gasped in shock. “I fear I’m not ready for marriage, Pidge, perhaps we should play another game. One with a little less lifetime commitments.”

“You don’t have to actually do any of those things.” Pidge further explained. “It’s all purely hypothetical. It’s just which one you’d rather do all those things with.”

“Oh. I see. Okay, if you three understand the rules then you play and I will join after a few rounds.” Allura nodded, also twisted over onto her stomach meaning that Lance once again had to lift up, this time his other leg, in order for her to twist smoothly.

“Okay. First round.” Hunk snorted evilly. “Haggar, Zarkon, Prince Lotor.” 

“How did I know that was going to be the first trio?” Lance could practically hear Pidge rolling her eyes from here.

“Easy!” Lance laughed. “Snog Zarkon, marry Prince Lotor and avoid Haggar. Harder one next time, Hunk.”

“You would snog Zarkon?” Allura gasped, almost appalled.

“If I snogged Zarkon, I could temporarily blind him with my amazing snogging skills, giving me the perfect opportunity to pull out my bayard and shoot him right in the chest.”

“Well why not marry Haggar and blind her with your bright personality then shoot her?” Hunk chuckled.

“I’ll be honest with you guys. I still don’t even believe she’s real. Like, I’ve never actually met her I don’t think? She could be ugly as hell for all I know and no offence but 10s do not marry 2s. 3s and up only, maybe 0,1 and 2s but only if they got a killer personality. Haggar's just a killer.”

“I don’t understand a word you just said but fine. Next question.” Pidge grumbled.

“You didn’t answer!”

“I’d go down the same route as you. Haggar is a ghost. You can’t kill what’s already dead so I’d rather stay away from her.”

“Sound logic.” Hunk nodded enthusiastically. “Okay, Lance you choose three names, Allura! Play this round.”

“I got a good one for you guys.” Lance giggled like a school boy. “Matt-”

“As in my brother? So I have no choice but to avoid my brother?” Pidge sighed.

“Let me finish, Pidgeon. Good ol’ anime meme Matt Holt, Coran or a weeblum.”

“I actually want to push you into empty space and leave you.”

“Cruelty. Absolutely butchery. I am disgusted by this bullying.” Hunk grumbled.

Lance laughed triumphantly. “You have to pick! Allura, what’s your answer?”

“Well… Since Coran is like a father to me, I’d have to avoid him. Snog the weeblum and I suppose that leaves marriage for young Matthew.” Allura nodded, thinking over her answer carefully as she spoke. 

“Matt is older than you but still, as I expected. Hunk, you go.”

“Listen. I have seen the inside of weeblum, and I don’t think I could take a relationship seriously with one after that. So I’d have to avoid the weeblum. And I mean, Matt is great and all but only for one night, if we were together for too long we’d eventually argue over who properly fixed the cuff modulator on the reflux defibrillator and it’d be a messy divorce and I don’t know who’d get the kids, so he’s only getting a snog from me and then that leaves marriage for dear old Coran. He’s getting into his later years now, I feel he could tell me a lot of wise stories and teach me a lot in the years he has left.”

“He’s not that old, Hunk.” Lance grinned. “Okay, Pidge, your turn. Tell me what I wanna hear.”

Pidge groaned long and loud before twisting over onto their stomach to join the rest of them, Lance thankfully not leaning on her so not needing to move.

“Avoid my brother, snog Coran and marry a weeblum.”

“You’d… you’d marry the weeblum?” Allura frowned, completely confused.

“Listen, I’m a scientist. No matter who I marry they are going to get subjected to multiple tests and experiments. I might as well marry someone who could teach me something.”

“You are such a geek and I love you.” Hunk laughed, reaching his hand into the snack bag and taking a massive handful which he immediately dropped into his mouth.

“Pidge, you can go now and you can be mean if you want, since I was.” Lance chuckled. 

“Fine. You want mean, I’ll give you mean. Nyma, Plaxum or Keith.”

Hunk and Allura immediately gasped in shock as if Pidge had just used the most horrible curse word in the known universe, each spared glances in Lance’s direction as if this were really a hard question.

“What were you really expecting? Avoid Nyma, snog Plaxum, and marry Keith. I’m not the fun one for this round, what about you two?” Lance shot his eyes towards the other two who suddenly looked very uncomfortable.

“I mean, I love Keith-” Allura started.

“So do I.” Hunk agreed.

Allura gulped. “He’s an amazing paladin.”

“So amazing.” 

“But I’d have to avoid him.”

“Me too.”

Lance gawped. “You’d both avoid Keith? I’m sorry have you seen him? That boy is heaven sent, he is god’s gift. His face sculpted out of marble and his ass hand painted by Michelangelo himself. You don’t avoid Keith, hell you don’t even just snog Keith. He is at least heavy petting.”

“Lance.” Pidge groaned, covering their ears. “Did you have to make it gross?”

“Can you blame me?” Lance chuckled. “That boy is just… Ugh… tasty.”

“Pump the breaks, McClain.” Hunk groaned too, stealing one of Allura’s pillows from the end of the bed to cover his face. “And to actually answer the question, avoid Keith, snog Plaxum, marry Nyma.”

“Same goes with me.” Allura nodded.

“You’re both crazy. Insane. Kissed by the woowoo gods. I can’t with this damn tomfoolery anymore.”

“You are so dramatic, Lance.” Pidge snorted before suddenly pausing to cover their mouth as a massive body-shaking yawn erupted from inside her.

“Pidge is right. It’s getting late. We should probably head back to our rooms.” Hunk yawned. “Cause no matter what time Allura goes to sleep she’ll still be up first thing and knock all our butts outta bed.”

“Well, of course.” Allura smiled.

“Okay. Last round. Last round. Just for Allura this time, then we’ll go to bed. Ready? Okay, Allura… Choose wisely. Pidge, Hunk, or me.”

Pidge groaned once more. “Lance you-”

“I already know what she’s going to say. I just need to hear it.” Lance smirked evilly, twisting his body so he could see Alluras painstakingly blank expression.

“Marry Pidge, snog Hunk, avoid you.”

“What?!” Lance gasped. “Allura, we bonded, how could you? Why?”

“Well… Pidge is very similar to myself, our personalities get on quite well, I feel we would have a long and very happy marriage. Then there’s Hunk, Hunk would probably have just been cooking something new and delicious in the kitchen so a kiss would be like a sneak preview of what’s to come later.”

Lance pouted. “Some would say kissing me is a sneak preview of what’s to come later. Or who’s to come later.”

“I’m leaving.” Pidge jumped from the bed immediately, grabbing their half drunk water pouch on the way.

“Me too.” Hunk jumped up as well. “Good night, Allura. Good night, Pidge. See you in hell, Lance.”

“How will I see you when we’re already there?” Lance laughed, not sparing a second before jumping to his feet and propelling himself onto his best friends back before he could escape. “Good night, Allura, thank you for tonight.”

“Good night, paladins, I will see you in the next cycle. Sleep well.”

Lance smiled as Hunk carried him from the room and down the corridors. For the first time in months, Lance had a feeling that tonight would be the first night where he really could sleep well.


	7. Chapter Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay with this one.   
> Before I even started releasing this story I had Chapters 1-6 and 8 all complete. Chapter 7 was just a nightmare for me and there's a lot of it I didn't enjoy writing. Which you'll probably be able to spot as you read through.

Weeks passed and Lance finally thought he was falling into a routine, sure he was stuck on the ship, officially banned from any missions that took place but he was managing to find some comfort in being stuck on the castle all day.

The training helped. Well the training he actually went to, Shiro had decided that Lance’s training was to be doubled for the time being but Lance knew certain ways to trick the system. Getting it to say that Lance was in there, using the gladiators or the bots or whatever it was he fancied, while he could actually be somewhere else doing something entirely different. Thus far, Shiro hasn’t clicked the glitch in the system and that was working in the Red paladin’s favour.

That isn’t to say he wasn’t training, he was, there wasn’t much else for him to do otherwise. He practiced with his bayard for a few hours a day, trying new techniques to further his skills and abilities, small targets, moving targets, and the like. But there’s only so many times you can score 98 out of 100 before you piss yourself off and have to leave for fear that if you didn’t, you’d rip the entire training room control panel from the ship and throw it across space.

Lance also restarted his yoga. Another thing that helped pass the time, and help him feel a little better about himself, Lance could be single and lonely but he’ll always have his flexibility to fall back on. When he gets back to Earth the first thing he’s going to do (after calling his mom obviously) is make his way to the first gay bar he can find, attract some six foot teddy bear looking man and bounce on that dick like he’s in Cuba’s first olympic space hopper race.

… Anyway, pushing that thought into the back of his mind for later. During yoga, Lance focused a lot on keeping his shoulders pain free, using some of the tips he’d remembered Dacor use on him and it was actually doing some good, he didn’t feel as much of the pain from his gun kickback as he had from before his meeting with the handsome blade member.

Oh Dacor.

When Lance left the marmora base, he thought he wouldn’t be hearing from Dacor for a while, but only a couple days after his return to the ship, Pidge stomped into his room with a pout on her face. 

“Lance, some purple dude keeps asking to talk to you!”

Lance was surprised as he took the small mobile like device from his younger paladin and was even more surprised when Dacor’s shy smile had met him. The two had talked for a while and have been talking regularly since, not about much in particular, just talking about themselves. How their days have been. Future missions they may or may not be involved in. 

It was nice. Domestic almost.

A welcome distraction from the real trouble that had been playing on Lance’s mind.

Keith, unlike Dacor, hadn’t contacted him once. He’d said nothing, done nothing, and like a gust of Earth wind against his cheek, Lance could do nothing but remember him. Remember their last conversation before he left the marmora base. He’d promised Keith that he’d get over him, that he’d manually reset their relationship back to that first day when they found Blue. 

Rivals.

The word sat heavy on Lance’s lips, he didn’t want to be rivals. He’d gotten to know Keith so well, even outside of the two of them hooking up. He didn’t want to just throw all of that away. If he could just get over him, maybe he could talk to Keith again, explain that he still wanted a friendship of sorts.

But maybe that was just the part of him that liked him that wanted that, the part of him that wanted to always keep him close.

Stupid Allura. Making Lance realise that he was in love with the stupid, mullet-headed, moron. If he hadn’t he would never be in this mess, he’d be going about his life totally indifferent about his feelings with nothing to need to fix and sort out. 

“Your relationship is getting in the way of Voltron.” Lance could almost hear Shiro’s father voice resonating through his brain, sure Shiro had no knowledge of Keith and Lance’s relationship that he knew of, but he could still picture it and hear it loud and clear in his brain. 

Him and Keith couldn’t have a relationship, Lance just had to accept that. It might hurt, it might suck, but it be like that sometimes. It’s better to get over it and move on, like Keith has, than to let himself suffer and let the team suffer. Let Voltron suffer.

Lance sighed to himself, rolling himself over onto his side. He’d been in bed all morning since no one had tried to look for him, but it was getting a little ridiculous now. Laying in bed moping all day was just going to make him feel worse. 

Since returning, his sleeping had gotten a little better, he tended to sleep most of the way through the night now unlike before the mission with Pidge where he was waking up every couple of hours, drenched in sweat and a voice hoarse from calling out for something that Lance didn’t know. He’d also started sleeping in his own bed properly, he wasn’t going to slip and make the mistake of sleeping in Keith’s anymore because that was just going to bring more pain than Lance was willing to accept right now. 

Lance sighed as he slowly rolled out of bed and onto his own two feet, he’d been dressed a while since he  _ had _ already been up once this morning to shower. He ruffled his hand through his hair to brush any knots out before leaving his room, the door closing shut loudly behind him. 

Lance didn’t feel like training right now, thinking of Keith always made him feel weak and pathetic, a feeling he wasn’t going to indulge by training and being overly critical of every little thing he did wrong. Since he was feeling this way, he would do other things. Like check in with his friends or go visit Blue for a chat or-

Well… He couldn’t really visit Blue either. It felt almost wrong to visit a lion that wasn’t even his anymore. Plus, it seemed like since the shift in the team, his connection was Blue was pretty much non-existent. He hadn’t felt her pull at their bond at all over these last couple of months. 

So, when Lance reached the hangars on the lower deck, he continued walking when he reached the door into Blue, further down the corridor to the hangar next door. He pushed the door open and slowly walked in. He approached his target apprehensively, he hadn’t seen her in many weeks now, not avoiding her as such, but not feeling a great enough connection to visit her like this when he didn’t have a mission.

He finally stopped in front of her and let out a sigh of relief that she didn’t kick him or something in response to his presence.

“Hey Red.” Lance whispered, reaching forward and rubbing his hands along the mechanical beast’s paws. “Long time no see.”

The Red lion met it’s paladin with pure silence, and Lance could tell through their bond that she was giving him the silent treatment.

“Oh come on, girl.” Lance sighed, now choosing to hop on to one of her paws and sit cross legged on top of her. “Don’t you be mad at me too.”

Lance felt the familiar pull at his lion bond, Red trying to communicate with him, but he couldn’t understand what she was trying to say. His bond with Red was nothing like his bond with Blue. When Lance was still the blue paladin, he and his lion were inseparable, she would feed him images of scenes to try and speak with him, showing him beaches or forests when she was happy, or dark caves and tall mountains when she was worried. Lance understood that, could understand what she was saying. But with Red, it was nothing like that. 

Red never replied to Lance’s words, or fed images into his brain, the only image that Red had given him was a simple flash of purple across his brain, no image, just the colour. He couldn’t understand, couldn’t understand the way she worked.

He envied Keith that he had been able to bond so strongly with her, and seemingly bond well with the black lion as well. Why couldn’t Lance be like that? Why was he so weak? It’s not like he had a choice about leaving Blue but surely, if he was a good paladin, he’d have been able to bond with Red easily.

No such luck.

Lance felt a growl rumble through his bones but he shrugged it off, he couldn’t understand her at all.

“Paladins, please make your way to the bridge.” Coran’s bright and totally untimely voice suddenly called across the sound system. “Debriefing for the next mission in precisely 3 dobashes.”

Lance sighed, pulling himself off of Red’s paw and back onto his own feet. He gave a soft pat once more to Red before sighing heavily. “I’ll talk to you later, girl.”

He turned softly and left the room as fast as his legs could carry him. Maybe Lance was a little crazy, or maybe a just a little paranoid, but he could definitely feel Red’s eyes following him as he left. Probably judging him to no end and thinking about what a terrible paladin he was compared to her last two, wondering how she could have been so unlucky to end up with someone like Lance.

Red growled again through the bond but Lance elected to ignore her as he made his way up the short journey from the hangars up to the bridge. When he entered, he was surprised that he was the first one here. Only Coran was stood by his control panel, pressing buttons quickly before turning around after hearing Lance’s entrance.

“Lance.” He smiled immediately walking over to pat the young paladin on his shoulder. “I feel like I haven’t seen you for quintants. I’ve heard that you’ve been stuck on punishment training.”

“Yeah.” Lance huffed awkwardly, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Been misbehaving a lot lately.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Coran chuckled in return, but didn’t further explain what he meant. “Take a seat, Lance, the other’s will arrive soon.”

As if on cue, the door opened and in walked Hunk and Pidge, talking animatedly about something that Lance couldn’t understand even if he tried. Lance was multilingual, but Science was not one of his known languages.

“Hey buddy!” Hunk greeted as he caught eyes with Lance across the room, the two youngest paladins making their way over to him. 

“Hey you two. What have you guys been doing this fine space morning?” Lance flashed them the biggest smile he possibly could.

“Working.” Pidge mumbled, obviously going in to the real specifics of what she was up to.

“I’ve been cooking most of the morning.” Hunk shrugged, rubbing his tummy happily. “Trying some new recipes, testing out some ingredients, then I gave up and just decided to make some sweet treats.”

“Yum.” Lance smiled. “Do you need a fresh, clean palette who’s willing to test those for you? ‘Cause I happen to know a guy who might be really interested.”

Hunk snorted in amusement. “Sure. Give him my info and tell him to drop by after this mission briefing and he can try out whatever he likes.”

“Awesome.” Lance grinned back, stomach already excited for the delicious creations that Hunk would make.

“So where’s the Princess and Shiro?” Pidge asked, an evil glint in their eyes. “Not like them to be the last ones to a meeting that they arranged.”

Lance snorted. “Maybe they made up and now they’re fuc-”

As if right on cue, the bridge doors suddenly opened. 

“Sorry for our tardiness, Paladins.” Allura suddenly burst through the door, Shiro just a few steps behind her as they joined the rest of them on the bridge. Alluras cheeks were red and puffy as if she'd been crying but her face was stone and harsh, angry. “We were just working out the final details with Prince Lotor.”

“Another job from Lotor?” Pidge sneered but when Lance turned to the youngest he saw the concern flare up on her face for Allura as well.

“I wouldn’t trust that guy with a rock, let alone our lives. Why are doing what he says again?” Hunk grumbled but his complaint remained unanswered as the two leaders stepped forward to the front and turned back to the group.

“Before we begin.” Allura stood at the front of the group, standing straight and tall like the royalty she was as she addressed her guard. Shiro stood sheepishly behind her, as if one wrong move would result in his beheading… perhaps it would. “There are a few issues with this mission that will make it a lot more difficult for whichever paladin is selected to take part in this mission, one being that this a solo mission. You’ll have the rest of us watching closely, but Shiro and I have decided that it would be best for the paladin selected to go covert and on their own.”

Shiro nodded before stepping forward himself slowly, watching Allura cautiously, his hands at his hips with his very serious dad face looking over all of them. 

“This is not like the other missions that Lotor has supplied us with.” Shiro explained. “The details are weak and a lot of information is missing, the person who goes on this mission will have to be able to think quickly and adapt to new information immediately.”

“I guess that rules me out.” Hunk mumbled, jabbing an elbow jokingly into Lance’s side. “It’s okay. I don’t even want to go, I’ve got cookies in the oven and this will totally mess with my plans.”

Lance chuckled but kept his eyes glued on their black paladin as he continued to speak.

“All that is certain is that this base contains a mutated version of quintessence, and that it must be procured before Haggar is able to get her hands on it. According to Lotor, due to his betrayal to the galra empire, certain galra generals as well as Haggar, are starting to put in place extra security on their biggest secrets. This quintessence is something we cannot afford for the Galra to learn it’s secrets. We have no idea what types of changes this quintessence could have gone through and we can’t risk that falling into enemy hands.”

Pidge nodded. “Well, I can’t go, I have to stay here and work through the system, guide whoever it is that chooses to go via the schematics. It would be easier for me to stay on the castle.”

So that just left Shiro or Allura.

“This is a stealth mission so because of such we should send the person most likely to be able to get the job done.”

Lance stepped back, he knew Shiro wasn’t going to choose him, Lance was fairly sure that their leader was still pissed at him for his mess up on the mission with Pidge. Even though that wasn’t exactly his fault… and all he was doing was what he thought was best. Staying back so that everyone else could get to safety. Still, Shiro was the leader for a reason, what he said went.

Lance turned to wandering his thoughts when suddenly he felt a hand on his shoulder pulling him back to the present before he could even leave.

“Lance. I’m leaving this one to you.”

Without even really thinking of his audience, Lance immediately broke out into a giggle. Shiro really knew how to mess around, it was moments like these where Lance knew that their black paladin did in fact have a sense of humour and wasn't just a massive stick in the mud.

“Good one, Shiro. That definitely tickled my pickle. I'll remind you have that humour of yours on your next grumpy dad day.”

Shiro looked at him, almost perplexed which just sparked Lance’s own confusion. He  _ was  _ kidding right? He'd seemed pretty serious when he'd lectured Lance only a few weeks ago.

Allure stepped forward, Lance caught the the soft elbow she delivered into Shiro to move past him. She gave Lance one of her winning smiles. “The Red lion and it's paladin is most suitable to this mission, it will be a quick in and out task which requires you to use your stealth skills to get through undetected, plus your bayard is the best suited. It doesn't require you to be in close hand-to-hand when the likelihood is security will be expansive and need quick elimination. You, Lance, are the best and only choice.”

Lance hummed, a little taken aback but he wasn't about to argue. He did want to get out afterall. Plus, this wasn't even a group mission, this was a solo mission, the ultimate “you're of the hook now” mission.

“I mean okay. Does this mean my mission ban is officially ended?” Lance gulped looking directly at Shiro, who almost looked… embarrassed?

“We will see how this one goes first.”

Lance smirked. “I can live with that.”

Not long after that, Lance suited up, jumped into Red and started on his journey towards his target. A few vargas passed and Lance could see the ship approaching on his navigator. All Lance could think about the entire journey was how good Hunks food was and theorising what delicious treats would be waiting for him when he returned.

It helped to pass the time… almost.

As soon as the ship could be spotted in his visual, Lance opened his comms up to the castle once more, Lance had been banned from keeping his comms open at all times months ago after Pidge made a petition which everyone in the castle signed. Apparently none of the team appreciated Lance singing the same two lines from his favourite Shakira song over and over again which was projected throughout the castle. 

Note: Lance’s favourite Shakira song was hips don't lie, obviously.

“Approaching the target now.” Lance declared in his best voice for all to understand. He did have Shiro to impress after all. “Awaiting instructions.”

“Good work.” Shiro responded a few ticks later. “Continue making your way forward. We have your position on our monitors.”

“Roger Roger.” Lance grinned as he pushed Red forward. Although Lance missed his old Blue, and would definitely trade this rusty piece of scrap metal he was currently piloting if he could have her back, there were aspects of Red that he did appreciate. Specifically her speed.

The Red lion sped like a supervised bullet through the sky, weaved through asteroid fields and debris like it was a fun game. Lance enjoyed the control it gave him.

… He still preferred his own lion though. 

“Opening the hangar door now.” Pidge grumbled through the communicators before Lance really had the chance to think about how he really did miss his lady in blue. His lion hummed unhappily around him but as always, Lance elected to ignore her meaningless noises. Maybe she just needed an oil change or something, he mentally noted to ask Coran about that when he got back.

Trying to keep his mind focused, Lance slowly quided the red lion through the open hangar doors he watched open in front of him. Landing the red lion close to the door before exiting the cockpit, and leaving Red. Her barrier lit up immediately after he was out of range and he couldn’t help but flash her a quick thumbs up before readying his bayard at his side.

“Pidge, I’m in. Where to?”

“Leave the bay and head left, you’ll be on the main corridor. Take the first right you see and then wait for my instructions. I’m going to guide you through the empty corridors as there is a lot of sentry movement going on at the moment. Better you don’t get caught just yet.”

“Or at all. Y’know. At all, sounds nice.”

Lance left the hangar bay quickly, checking both directions of the corridor before stepping out and immediately following Pidge’s guidance. As soon as he reached the next corridor, Pidge immediately guided him corridor at a time, completely aware of his whereabouts at every single second he moved.

“Can you hurry up? You’d think a boy as tall as you could shift his ass a bit better?”

Lance whimpered, a little hurt that Pidge had brought Lance’s poor, usually neglected, ass into this but did as she told him anyway, quickening his pace until he was basically power walking down every corridor.

That is until, he had to stop and bend over, covering his ears as a loud siren went off above his head. After a few seconds adjusting, he stood up straight again just as Pidge chimed in. 

“Lance, what the hell is that noise?” Pidge snapped down the line. 

“That’ll be the alarm system.” Lance grunted, picking up his pace immediately.

He followed Pidge’s instruction’s to the T, bending down every corridor she told him to until he finally reached a large, closed door.

“One second.” Pidge grumbled quietly, Lance could again hear her tapping away maniacly on her end before suddenly the door in front of him clicked and began to slide apart so Lance could just wander in.

“You gotta teach me how to do that.” Lance smiled happily as the door shut behind him again. 

“And risk you being able to get to me when I’ve locked myself away from you for an afternoon of peace? Never.”

Lance chuckled back as his eyes immediately began to scan the room before finally settling on his prize.

“Target spotted.” Lance purred down his headset like one of those sexy cam girls on TV- Uhh, not that he ever watched them. He just heard that they sounded very sexy. No Lance was an avid man of the church, he would never watch anything like- 

Lance couldn’t even lie to himself. 

He quickly crossed the room and immediately wished that the paladin armour was brown instead of white. Lance knew the target as soon as he saw it, a clear vial filled with an almost luminescent liquid that was a bright shade of purple. But there was only one problem. It was hanging above a boiling pit of hot lava barely even near the edge of the platform.

“We have a bit of a problem.” Lance gulped.

Shiro was obviously the one fastest to respond. “What is it?”

“So I dunno how the galra were able to get a nice lava jacuzzi on their ship, side note, Allura can I have one of those please? But that’s where our little quintessence is sitting smug right about now. Looking at me.”

Shiro grumbled a few not PG-13 curses down into Lance’s ear before deciding. “Try and find a way to reach it for now. Then let us know what you found.”

Lance walked back to the entrance way, before making his way through the entire perimeter of the room, looking for some sort of button or lever that might fix his current problem. But alas, there wasn’t one. He checked the floor, even approached the pit a few times, holding his arm out above it until he pulled it back after it burnt- y’know, just to check that it actually was hot lava and not like… something a little more safe that Lance could risk jumping into. 

Irritated, Lance walked back to the door, checking the outside to make sure no sentries were surrounding him before he looked back to the vail. The distance wasn’t too far between the platform and the vial, maybe half a dozen feet? At a push?

He could always just… stretch for it? 

Lance was a lanky boy, nice long legs and arms, his mama always told him he’d be in the circus one day with a body like his. He never really knew if she was complimenting him or not. But still, he could just stretch and try and reach for the vile. It’s not like there were any better ideas being thrown his way. 

Lance nodded to himself, mind made up.

“Okay guys, I gotta plan.” Lance called back. “Hunk, put the kettle on.”

“There’s no time.” Pidge called back suddenly. “I’m seeing massive sentry movement on my screen, all heading in your direction. You should go now.”

“This won’t take a second.” Lance smirked as he turned back to the platform and heading towards it. Barely a few ticks later, Pidge was in his ear again.

“Sentry’s approaching from all angles. Lance you have to make it back to Red before they block your escape.” Pidge called out. “Just pull back and we’ll regroup.”

“I got this, don’t worry.” Lance nodded, pacing towards the end of the platform, the vial hovered about 5 ft in front of him but the bubbling lava beneath sent shivers down Lance’s spine. 

A column stood just beside the drop and Lance knew that would be his only way to get the vile. He positioned his feet between the column and the drop in a way that gave him the most balance before taking hold of the column with one hand and stretching out towards the vile with the other. His grip on the column being the only thing from keeping him from falling in. 

“I think I can reach it.” Lance grunted but he was still a few inches away. He shuffled his feet closer towards the edge and stretched again, his grip dangerously loose on the column now due to the distance away from it. 

Shiro’s growl rumbled down the receiver. “Lance, this is an order, get out of there now.”

“Just a little further.” Lance grumbled, reaching his hand out as far as he could, he could feel the fire tickling at his arm but it didn’t stop him. He just had a little further and then he would have it within his fingers. “Almost got it.”

“Lance!”

Lance released his fingers slightly from the bar he’d been holding and thankfully that shifted him the few extra centimeters he needed to grab the bottle of quintessence and yank it back against his chest, jumping backwards from the treacherous cavern and into the safety of hard ground beneath both his feet. 

“I’ve got it!” Lance called down his transmitter. “Extracting now.”

Without even pausing for a victory dance, Lance tucked tail and sprinted out of the room as quickly as he could, weaving down corridor after corridor with Pidge chanting directions in his ear.

“Lance, incoming sentries. Get your bayard out.”

Lance did as he was commanded, grabbing his bayard from his side which immediately transformed into his usual blaster. He pulled the gun up to chest height and aimed forward, finger on the trigger, ready to shoot any sentries who would try to sneak up on him. Not that they could though with Pidge chortling in his ear.

“Lance. Half a dozen sentries approaching from the corridor on your next left.”

Lance nodded, pointlessly since Pidge couldn’t actually see him, and twisted his body till he was walking sideways, twisting his gun ready to fire down the corridor Pidge had warned him about. As soon as he reached the corner, Lance heard the sound of blasters and immediately ducked back, narrowly missing a shot that scorched across his cheek.

Better prepared now, Lance rested his body against the wall, using it as cover as he ducked around now and again to fire shots, most of which were blind, down the long corridor. He heard a few metal bodies collapse to the ground, echoing down the corridor to his ears, and felt himself release a breath he didn’t realise he’d been holding. 

“Lance you have to hurry and get past this area, I can see multiple sentries approaching from behind you and more coming up on your left. Just shoot and run!” Pidge snapped down the receiver, taking Lance by surprise as he turned once more to fire multiple more shots down the corridor at his attackers.

“Screw it.” Lance rolled his eyes in irritation, he pulled his shield out which flashed alive instantly. Then, with a quick exhale to steady his pace, he jumped out from the behind the wall and stood directly in the middle of the corridor, using the shield to cover him as he was finally able to aim his shots a little better like this.

Sentry after sentry collapse but Lance almost gulped as a few more joined the pack from the back, Pidge’s warning coming true. He couldn’t stay here, he would only get overrun and then wouldn’t be able to get back to Red. He just had to keep shooting and then make a break for it when he had the cover to do so.

One minute, Lance was fine, confident even, the next, his entire weight was swept from beneath him. He watched oblivious of one sentry as it aimed it’s large blaster, it’s grip steady and calculating before pushing against the trigger. Lance watched the kickback of the gun push back on it’s metallic shoulder, knocking it back ever so slightly. It was like it all happened in slow motion, one blink and suddenly he caught eye of the beam of light heading straight towards him. He straightened up, moving his shield to better protect his chest when suddenly he felt his legs be knocked out from under him.

He fell to the ground, looking down at his thighs he saw the broken metal in his paladin armour, down a layer and the split in his paladin suit, then down another layer and the gaping wound in his lower thigh. 

As soon as he saw the wound, that was when the pain started.

Lance howled, screaming in pain as he fired blindly down at the remaining sentries, still aiming their shots at him. When each sentry fell to the floor, it was only then that Lance grabbed at his thigh, holding around the wound and watching as blood slowly pulsed out. 

“I’ve t-taken a hit.” He whimpered down the line.

“Lance, you have to move now. More are coming. Get to Red. Now!” Pidge snapped. 

“I don’t think I-”

“Do it now, Lance!”

He winced but quietly agreed, using his bayard as a cane he carefully pushed himself back onto his feet, resting all of his weight on his good leg. He just had to get out of here, he just had to get back to Red, he could do this. Just a little bit more.

He returned the direction he had been heading before, Pidge now frantically leading him, taking him different routes to avoid as many sentries as possible. Lance used the wall to steady himself but he couldn’t just run forever, eventually he heard the familiar beat of metal foot falls from behind him.

Lance fired blind shots, just trying to keep himself upright as he limped as best as he could, putting most of his weight down on his right leg, so much in fact that the right leg was beginning to tire and he felt his fatigue hit him like a tidal wave. But he kept running, using the adrenaline as fuel, continuing to fire blind behind his back. He didn’t even know if he was still being fired at, he couldn’t be sure if the sound echoing in his ears was the sound of footsteps or the sound of his own heartbeat, beating hard and loud inside him. 

He rounded a final corner and reached the door to the hangar where Red was waiting for him. She recognised him immediately and bent down to lower her mouth for Lance to get through, he gratefully did, using each of her teeth as support to help him inside before rounding up in to the cockpit.

The lights flashed up as he entered and Lance didn’t even pause before grabbing for his chair. 

“Red.” Lance whispered as he collapsed against his seat. “Get us out of here, buddy.”

He felt the softening purr of his lion against his mind, a surprise for her to treat him so warmly but a happy surprise that Lance couldn’t help from showing on his face, smiling as wide as lips would let him. He felt the exhaustion begin to take over him and his eyes began to droop.

Lance’s thoughts immediately turned to Keith. How many times had he run to Red in times of injury? Needing her to protect him? Lance could only hope that Red would do the same for him. 

As his eyes slowly began to close and his vision and mind faded into black, he felt the familiar hum of a lion beneath him, his lion, lifting herself from the ground and taking off with her paladin safely inside. For the first time, Lance could read into Red’s thoughts as clear as day. A flash of blue, blue like the ocean at Varadero beach, which soon morphed into a shade of orange, the colour of his Garrison uniform. Finally followed by solid violet, the same shade of Keith’s eyes when the morning lights of the castle caught him just so. So bright and beautiful that Lance immediately felt himself relax into his seat, his eyes unable to stay open anymore as he placed his life into his lion’s paws.

She was taking him home.


	8. Chapter Eight

_ “Lance.” A voice whispered through the void. “Lance where are you?” _

_ Lance turned his body around to meet the voice that had addressed him, he wasn’t surprised to see his new leader. Still wearing his Red paladin armour with the same sad smile he’d been wearing since even before his promotion to Black paladin. _

_ “Keith.” Lance whispered, stepping forward and pulling Keith against his chest, Lance was surprised when his friend didn’t push him away but perhaps that was just a tell of how exhausted he truly was. “How did it go?” _

_ “Still nothing.” Keith growled quietly beneath his breath. “It’s like he’s just gone. He’s nowhere. There’s not a single clue as to where he might be.” _

_ Shiro had been missing a few weeks now, since their battle with Zarkon. Keith had been out there every single day trying to search for him, for anything, Lance was sadly surprised by how there wasn’t even a trace of their old black paladin left. _

_ “I know you’re worried. We’re going to find him.” Lance whispered, running his fingers through Keith’s hair, careful not to pull on any of the knots that had formed. _

_ “How? Explain to me how, Lance.” Keith’s tone grew a lot darker, a lot angrier. Lance could understand why, that feeling of hopelessness, that lack of optimism, it would make any person sick with anger and rage. _

_ “I don’t know.” Lance sighed. “I can just feel it. I feel in my heart and soul that we will see him again, that we will find him. In this reality. We will find him.” _

_ “But I don’t know how, Lance. I don't- I feel so useless.” Keith growled again, tucking his head into Lance’s neck, most likely to hide away the sad expression that Lance knew he would have right now. “I can’t just sit here, standing where he stood, giving the orders that he once gave, I can’t pretend like that’s okay. It doesn’t sit well with me.” _

_ “It doesn’t sit well with me either. You think I like you being my boss?” Lance tried to joke but Keith gave absolutely no response. “He’s our family, Keith, we have to get him back. There’s no if’s or maybe. We have to and we will. No matter what it takes.” _

_ Lance caught the whimper escape from Keith’s throat and he immediately wrapped his arms around Keith’s waist, holding him close and tight, so tight that there was no way that Keith could ever think that he was alone in this. Lance would stand by his side, no matter what. _

_ “I need a distraction.” Keith suddenly sighed, pulling himself away from Lance’s hold until he was a couple of steps back. “I feel like my head’s going to pop otherwise.” _

_ “What kind of distraction?” Lance asked, not assuming anything. He would be whatever Keith needed, someone for Keith to vent to, a punching bag, anything. _

_ “Come to my room tonight.” Keith stared down at his feet to whisper. “Distract me.” _

_ Lance nodded, reaching forward a hand to brush against Keith’s cheek. “Of course.” _

_ He watched as Keith turned away immediately and walked off. Lance scanned his movements, the way his shoulders were dropped lower than usual, but his stance was tense. This whole problem with Shiro was really doing stuff to him and Lance felt useless as his friend left him. Leaving Lance alone in the dark.  _

One minute, Lance was floating on clouds. The next, he was free falling. His mind seemed to rush him to wake up at the sensation when suddenly the falling stopped and he fell against a hard surface. He grunted in pain but the pain didn’t last long when a sudden whiff of cinnamon grazed each of his senses, lulling him back into a feeling of security and safety.

“Is he okay?” A voice grumbled over head.

Another voice began to chortle against Lance’s mind. “Seems our red paladin has awoken a little more groggy than he usually does. Put him down on the table, he can sleep while I run my tests on him.”

Suddenly, Lance felt his gravity shift, that feeling of flying returning to him as he drifted slowly through space. He turned his head slightly, the smell of cinnamon was stronger here and stuck his nose into it before taking a deep inhale.

“What’s he doing?”

“He’s obviously smelling you.” A new voice grunted back, their tone unhappy. “You must need a shower.”

The new voice was met with silence and Lance felt himself shift again before suddenly his back was pressed against something hard and cold, the cinnamon aroma ripped away from him simultaneously.

“I’m going to train.” The first voice grumbled before Lance could hear soft footsteps getting quieter and quieter. 

Lance whimpered from the loss of his comfort and felt himself began to shiver what with the cold surface still against his spine.

“Why is he acting like this? Does he need longer in the pod?” The third grumpy voice seemed a little more worried now, less angry. 

“No, paladin.” The second voice mumbled. “What our dear red paladin is feeling cannot be remedied by the cryopod. The cryopod does not fix exhaustion. It seems like our second here has been overworking himself.”

The voices blurred out as Lance felt himself zone out again, his mind returning to the darkness.

_ Lance was walking through the castle corridors, his heading towards his paladin leader. He’d done as Keith had asked, left him alone during the day and now returning to him. His belly full from dinner still even though he ate a while back, putting in a quick one hour training session and then a long shower before finally making his way to Keith’s room. _

_ He entered without even knocking since he thought the two of them were close enough now to do that. But when he entered he was surprised to find the black paladin passed out on top of his sheets, still dressed in his full paladin armour. _

_ Lance sighed as he approached and got to work at slowly taking off every piece of Keith’s armour, careful not to jostle him back to the world of the wake. Keith had been going through a lot lately and if this was the only time he was getting some proper sleep then Lance didn’t want to take him from it. _

_ After every piece of armour was removed, Lance slowly slipped his hands beneath Keith’s back and thighs and lifted him carefully to press against his chest. Almost immediately, Keith leaned into his warmth, unconsciously lifting his arms to wrap around Lance’s neck, making it easier for Lance to crouch slightly and flick the blanket up and out of the way before putting Keith down at the far end of the bed closest to the wall. _

_ As he tried to pull away, Keith’s arms tightened and Lance couldn’t pull himself back.  _

_ “Alright…” He whispered, climbing into the bed himself, resting down beside Keith. Keith immediately rolled into him, his head against Lance’s chest as Lance reached for the blanket and pulled it back over the pair of them. Keith nestled himself in a little further, wrapping their legs together beneath the sheets before his breath evened out and a soft snore almost purred out between his lips. _

_ Lance almost couldn’t contain himself, he used one hand to softly stroke at Keith’s hair and the other to rub against his own forehead. _

_ Keith was so cute. _

_ Lance wished that he could’ve stayed awake for hours, just watching Keith, listening to the little purrs and moans that he let out while he was sleeping but those noises only seemed to lullaby Lance into his own state of relaxation, and only a few minutes later, he felt his vision begin to blur as he too entered the realm of the sleepers with Keith. _

“Lance. Lance, wake up.” A voice pulled him from his memories. Lance’s eyes fluttered open but he immediately squeezed them shut again after the bright lights almost blinded him. 

He stayed like that for a couple moments before flickering his eyes open again, squinting until he was fully adjusted to the lights. 

“Hey buddy.”

Lance turned his head to the voice and smiled weakly at his best friend staring down at him, a strangely pitiful expression across his face.

“Hunk.” Lance yawned, stretching his arms out. He looked around and noticed that he was on Coran’s metal examination table, dressed in only his paladin suit, minus the armour. “What’s going on?”

“You’ve been asleep.” Hunk whispered. “You came out of the cryopod this morning but went back to sleep. How are you feeling?”

Lance slowly pulled himself up to a seated position, Hunk kind enough to lend him a sturdy shoulder to support his weak muscles. “Rough.”

“Yeah. You look it.”

“Thanks.” Lance snorted, rubbing at his eyes.

“Haven’t you been sleeping recently?” Hunk mumbled. “Usually you wake up fine when you get out of the pod but today you didn’t even open your eyes until now.”

“Mmh.” Lance groaned. “I thought my sleeping was actually a lot better recently. What time is it?”

“It’s not long until dinner but Shiro wanted me to come wake up up. He’s got a new mission and he wants all of us present… How’s your leg feeling?”

Lance looked down at his leg, he’d almost forgotten the injury he’d taken in on his last mission. Still, the cryo pods were good at what they did and even through the cut in his suit, he could see that the injury had been reduced to nothing but a small pink scar against his olive skin. 

“Feels great.” Lance smiled sweetly. “Definitely doesn’t feel like I was shot… How many days have I been in the pod?”

“A week. The injury was quite bad, did you even fly Red back? Shiro tried to talk to you the entire time you were coming back but you weren’t answering even though Allura’s maps showed that Red was coming back home. Then when we got you out of your cockpit, you weren’t even awake, we carried you to the pod but you didn’t respond to anything, we thought-”

Hunk stopped as his voice suddenly turned hoarse, he reached up and rubbed at his eyes quickly. 

“We thought that we lost you.” Hunk finished. “Pidge was freaking out, Shiro had to take her out of the room because she kept shouting at Coran as he was trying to help you.”

“Pidge?” Lance blinked. “Really?”

“Of course, bro.” Hunk chuckled. “We all love you, none of us want to lose you.”

“Well… I’m sorry then.” Lance whispered, surprised by Hunk’s confession. “For scaring you all.”

“You better be.” Hunk mumbled. “I’ve been stress baking everyday since you went in. I’ve got lots of things for you to try if you’re up for it.”

As if Hunk’s words had beckoned the beast awake, Lance’s stomach immediately released a loud and long grumble that echoed through the room.

“I’ll take that as a yes.” Hunk chuckled, wrapping his arms around Lance’s waist and lifting him from the table and onto his own two feet. 

Lance wobbled slightly so Hunk didn’t remove his arms and practically carried Lance from the room and into the hallway.

“Keith is here, by the way” Hunk mumbled after a moment, as they began heading towards the kitchen. “He arrived while you were in the pod.”

“Oh.” Lance whispered, he didn’t really want to see Keith right now, he still wasn’t sure if he was ready to start another argument so soon after their last. “What does he want?”

“Shiro said that Kolivan has sent him back for a few weeks. The blades are going covert for a few weeks before they move into their new base, they want to draw attention away from them for a while before they do that.”

“Explains why he got rid of Keith then.” Lance chuckled.

“That’s what I said.” Hunk snorted back. “He’s already caused multiple arguments while being here. He seems a lot more on edge than he used to be. Maybe he’s jealous that he’s not the leader anymore.”

“Hunk-”

“I don’t mean that in a bad way.” Hunk rushed out. “He was our leader for a while, he got used to making the plans and carrying them out. He was good at it too, but it’s hard to turn that off when the true leader returns. That’s all I meant.”

“Well… Let’s face it. Shiro is hard to argue with so I understand if he’s been a little frustrated while he’s been here.”

“Plus you haven’t been here.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Lance chuckled.

“The peacemaker? Out for the count? It’s all yelling and no fixing. It’s like trying to bake a cake with just flour, and no egg. Mess.”

Lance shook his head in disbelievement as the two continued the rest of their walk to the kitchen in silence.

When they arrived, they entered slowly, Lance trying to pull some of his weight off of Hunk and more onto his own legs, well that was the plan, until suddenly he was lifted up bridal style and almost rushed across the width of the kitchen.

Hunk carefully lifted him by the waist and placed him down on the counter before getting to work and scrambling the food together. 

“Hunk, why aren’t we married yet?”

Hunk snorted but that was the only reply he got as Hunk continued his hunt. Lance was content swinging his legs back and forth and humming some song he couldn’t place the name of under his breath until suddenly the kitchen doors hissed open again. 

Lance turned his head to meet the sound and was happy to see his favourite Green paladin walking in and straight towards him. Pidge always had dark bags under her eyes from the lack of sleep she gave herself, but even from where he sat Lance could see that they were multiple shades darker than before he’d gone in.

Was it self-absorbed to think that maybe that had been caused by Lance’s absence? Either way, it was unacceptable. The girl was still a child in his eyes and Lance knew how important it was that she got enough sleep.

“Pidge!” Lance grinned, beckoning her closer with a crooked finger. “Come here my tiny, little, gremlin child.”

Pidge glared at him but to Lance’s surprise, she slowly approached him and jumped up beside him on the counter, leaning into him slightly. 

“You’re awake.” She mumbled.

“I sure am.” He smirked, turning towards her. “And I heard that you missed me.”

“Did you hit your head as well?” Pidge snorted. “Why would I miss you? I was able to actually get some peace and quiet for once.”

Lance grinned and before the girl could escape, he pounced. Snaking his arms around her waist and pulling her in close, layering wet kisses and licks all over her forehead and cheeks as she squealed and swore, trying to escape. After a couple more licks, Lance released his grip and the girl immediately flung herself away from him till she was a good few feet away. 

“You’re an ass!” She growled, rubbing off all of the saliva on her face. 

“I love you too.” Lance giggled, reaching out grabby hands to snatch her up again but she was quick and immediately hightailed it out of the kitchen, screaming profanities too awful for Lance’s christian ears as she left.

“One of these days, you’re going to wake up bald and she is going to be stood above you, laughing down at you.” 

“I look forward to the day.” Lance smirked. “Now come on Hunk, feed me already.”

For the next half an hour, Lance was blessed with different foods and treats which Hunk almost forced down his best friend’s throat, not that Lance minded. Every taste was like velvet against his taste buds, every sensation better than the next. He ate as much as he could, until his stomach was bloated and full where he had to ask Hunk to stop. 

“Okay. Now you’ve eaten,” Hunk smiled, putting the food back safely into the storage container fridge. “We should probably join the others on the bridge. You good to walk yet?”

Instead of answering, Lance pushed himself from the counter onto his own two feet. His thigh twinged a little at the absorbance shock but was otherwise okay and Lance didn’t even feel too wobbly anymore.

“Ready when you are, beautiful.” Lance winked. 

Hunk smiled sweetly and followed behind, the two talked between themselves about what had happened since Lance had been asleep, a couple of solo missions for Hunk, a few projects with Pidge specifically on the new quintessence that Lance had acquired the previous week. Apparently, Allura for some reason had been quite the recluse this week, rarely leaving her room and if she did she would be in the bridge talking only with Coran. Shiro however had barely left Lotors cell, staying until early hours into the morning and only leaving for 3 or 4 hour naps back in his room before returning to Lotor again. 

It didn’t take long for the pair to reach the doors to the bridge. 

The two entered quietly as to not disturb too much if conversations were taking place but as soon as he entered, four pairs of eyes immediately zoned in on him and a loud gasp echoed against the bridge walls.

“Lance!” Allura’s familiar voice suddenly cried out, Lance turned his face but didn’t get much time to focus as suddenly he was knocked back against Hunk’s chest, a body wrapped entirely around his shoulders. “I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“Allura?” Lance stuttered in surprise, Allura rarely ever acted like this. “Are you okay?”

“Of course I’m okay!” She pulled away as if offended. “You’re the one who’s been in the pods for a week. Are you okay? Does your leg feel better? Do you need to rest? You don’t have to come on this mission, in fact I’d rather you didn’t, it would be better for you to relax for a few days and just take it easier and make sure that you properly heal up.”

Lance frowned but happily took the hug as Allura suddenly pressed into him again, running her mouth about reasons why Lance should be in bed and not awake right now and he was definitely more than anything not ready for a mission after only really just getting out of the pod and sleeping off the effects of it. 

“Allura. I’m fine.” Lance smiled, a dopey smile spread across his cheeks. “I wanna go wherever it is we’re going. I’ve already taken a week off, I can’t continue this slacking behaviour.”

Allura pulled away, not convinced but she didn’t argue. The two watched each other for a minute before suddenly Shiro stepped between the pair of them, right into Lance’s line of sight.

“I’m glad to see you’re okay, Lance.” Shiro rested a hand on his shoulder as Allura pulled away a couple more steps. “We could not be without our Red paladin, and I’m very happy that you were still able to complete the mission.”

Allura cocked her head, for some reason glaring at the Black paladin as if he’d said something insulting, Lance couldn’t be more surprised or happy with the compliments, Shiro didn’t offer them out in bundles so Lance would take anything thrown at him. 

“It is good to have you safe.” Shiro mumbled, suddenly turning almost shy as he pulled Lance in for a loose short hug before pulling back and coughing. “Now, let’s get back to what we were talking about.”

The four made their way to the remaining two individuals in the room, one of which was Coran who swept Lance up in a spinning hug, thanking the ancients that Lance was better and finally awake which just caused Lance to blush a whole new colour to his skin and almost feel a little sick nearly.

When Coran pulled back, Lance looked and suddenly looked eyes with the one person he was hoping he could avoid for just a little longer.

“Keith.” Lance gulped as the previous red paladin made eyes with him. “Nice to have you back.”

Keith frowned and immediately turned away without speaking a single word.

Lance turned to Hunk who was glaring back at Keith, harder than Lance had ever seen him glare before. What was Hunk so mad about?

“Lance!” A new voice from behind suddenly snarled, Lance turned and was surprised to see the youngest paladin stomping towards him. “How many times? Tell your stupid boyfriend to stop calling my phone.”

Lance frowned and took out the outstretched mobile device that Pidge looked like she was almost about to throw at him. 

Lance held the device close and couldn’t help but smile when the familiar blush of his new friend stared back at him. “Dacor!”

“Hello, Paladin.”

“Dacor, I thought you and the blades were supposed to be keeping a low profile. Is transmitting your whereabouts across the universe really a good idea?” Lance chuckled immediately feeling a lot happier, it had felt like years since he'd seen Dacor’s smiling face looking up at him.

Dacor coughed awkwardly before scratching at his cheek in embarrassment. “It’s a secure line, paladin. I heard of your injury so I wanted to make sure you were alright.”

Lance smiled again before looking up and bidding the rest of the room a quick farewell before stepping out the room to continue his conversation with Dacor, or at least he was about to before he caught the glare Keith was shooting at him.

“Shiro,” Lance gulped, retracing back. His mother had taught him not to be rude afterall. “Is it alright if I just step outside for a moment?”

The black paladin looked to Allura for a second who was smirking at Lance, the two seemed to be having their own telepathic conversation, Allura just sending bad mojo-jojo his way which Shiro probably could even see himself, as he eventually sighed. “Yes, of course, just don’t take too long.”

Keith growled from the other side of Allura, surprising the lot of them that he was speaking up. “We’re supposed to be talking about the mission. What, do we just put the universe on hold now while Lance tries to get his dick wet?”

Lance gawped and gasped in surprise before quickly turning on his heel and speed walking his way out of the room so Dacor wouldn’t hear anymore of these ridiculous accusations.

Instead of walking too far, he just moved to the wall opposite the doors and leaned against it as the doors slowly shut and Dacor and he were left with some kind of privacy.

“How are you?” Dacor whispered, Lance could hear the worry in his tone.

“Back to normal.” Lance smiled back, reassuringly. “It was just a little wound, the healing pod has just fixed me right up.”

“A little wound? When your small Green friend told me after it happened they made it sound like they very nearly lost you.”

Lance shrugged, trying to come off as nonchalant as possible. “Pidge is dramatic. It really wasn’t that bad. So I basically got to nap for a week, I’m already feeling so much better for it.”

“Lance-”

“Dacor, I promise.” Lance insisted. “I’m honestly fine. The only thing I wish is that I’d been in a little longer since I’ve woken up to find Keith here. He’s hard to deal with all the time, even worse after being in a pod for a week.”

“I know you’ve told me before that you and young Keith don’t have the easiest of relationships.” Dacor nodded.

“I wouldn’t say that, Keith and I got on really well for a while, he was like my rock for a while too and I thought I could be his but… It just wasn’t meant to last.” Lance rubbed at the back of his neck awkwardly, he’d only really talked about his relationship with Keith to Hunk and Allura. It almost felt wrong to talk about it with Dacor who was still mostly a stranger, but he trusted Dacor and he knew Dacor would be respectful with the information. 

“You and the young paladin were in a romantic relationship?” Dacor wondered, cocking his head to the side in confusion like a puppy. “But not anymore.”

“Well… It wasn’t a romantic relationship, no.” Lance blushed. “We just kinda used each other to relieve stress, that’s all. But not anymore, but it seems that we just can’t get along anymore and I don’t know how to fix it.”

“I see.”

“I’m not really sure what to do, Dacor.” Lance sighed. “How do I get back to being friends?”

“Well…” Dacor mumbled, Lance could almost see the cogs clicking in his mind. “Let your personality do the talking. Treat him as you do all your paladins, joke and laugh with him, let him know that you’re still a golden person that anyone would be friends with.”

“Please. I have the personality of a dead fish.” Lance snorted, disbelievingly. 

“That is the biggest lie I have ever heard.” Dacor couldn’t help but laugh down the receiver. “I know you Lance, I know that your personality and looks match up in terms of beauty. You are a gem, inside and out.”

“Stop using this conversation to give me compliments.” Lance blushed even deeper, immediately covering the camera so Dacor couldn’t see how red he was getting.

Dacor laughed back, deep and hearty and Lance felt himself swell at the sound. “Well, young paladin, I could never stop doing that. But, I am glad that you are definitely better now and I shall leave you to return to your team.”

“Alright, Dacor.” Lance mumbled, still hiding his blushing cheeks. “I’ll talk to you soon.”

“Stay safe, my paladin.”

“You too, Mister Blade.” Lance moved his hand from his face just to throw a quick salut before both exited the call simultaneously.

Lance gave his heart a minute to slow down before he walked back into the bridge, leaving Pidge’s phone in her chair and then returning to stand with the group.

“Ooh.” Hunk teased as he suddenly caught sight of Lance’s face. “Look at your face, you’re blushing so red right now. What scandalous things were you talking about?”

“Shut up, Hunk!” Lance whined, covering his face as he blushed another couple more shades deeper, he didn’t want to be teased for this, especially from his best friend. 

Suddenly, Keith snarled from across the room, turning all eyes to him. “So. Can we actually continue now or does Lance have someone else he’s fucking that he’s gotta talk to?” 

Lance gasped in surprise but then Dacor’s words returned to him. The only way that Keith and Lance were going to be back to their old selves was for Lance to treat him as he does his friends, tease him like he did Pidge, support him like he did Hunk. Maybe a little flirting like he did with Allura.

“If I didn’t know any better, that sounds like jealousy.” Lance smirked, making smacky lips at his fellow paladin teasingly, of course he had to go with being flirty, Lance is a simple man at heart. “There’s plenty of Lance to go around, Keith.”

Keith growled and immediately turned away, but Lance caught the red tinge to his cheek as he went. 

“You’re an idiot.” He grumbled back.

“An idiot you’re stuck with though.” Lance smirked back, resting one arm on Hunk’s shoulder. “How many times have I come back from the dead now? You’re all stuck with me.”

Allura winced and Lance immediately shut up, okay, maybe it was still a little early for death jokes but he thought it had been funny. 

“Okay, so as I was saying.” Shiro coughed awkwardly, making worried eyes at Allura for just a second before returning his focus to the groups. “There’s just a few solo missions on offer for anyone who’s willing, we’re not doing any large scale attacks until all of us have fully healed and recuperated from our previous encounters. Allura has brought it to my attention that we have been going hard and fast for quite a while now and that’s not good for us.”

“I would’ve thought Allura liked it hard and fast.” Lance smirked, ceasing the opportunity while it was there. 

Allura glared at him, but he could see the light heartedness in her eyes so just smiled even wider at her.

“Lance.” Shiro spoke up, firm as always. “Because of your injury, you will not be going on any solo missions until my say so.”

“Damn.” Lance shrugged. “Just back to how it was before then anyway, no biggie.”

“I have decided that any missions you go on, Keith will be joining you in the red lion.” Shiro nodded.

Lance cocked his head in surprise. “Wait, what? Why? Can’t I just go with my man Hunk? Why do I get partnered off with grumpy cat over there?”

Keith hissed, just furthering Lance’s point.

Lance held his hands up, his jokey attitude making it’s appearance for the first time in a while. “I mean- I don’t want to play the injury card here. But I died. I was dead for like almost 20 years there, I need my Hunk medication, my Hunky man makes everything better. Or Pidge! I’d take Pidge, and Allura, in fact Allura I must insist. I can’t even walk you know, I feel a blood clot coming on from all this stress you’re giving me, in fact I need to sit down. Put me back in the healing pods. I’m dying guys.”

Hunk laughed at Lance’s antics and even Allura couldn’t help but hide a giggle behind her hand but Shiro’s expression held firm.

“Sorry, Lance. This is something I must insist.” He nodded. “Keith can’t very well ride with me in Black so he will be with you in the Red lion. Starting today. Go gear yourself up because the pair of you are heading down to the planet surface that we’re currently orbiting to go and collect some supplies.”

Lance groaned, loud and dramatic.

A supply run. With Keith. In one lion.

Fantastic.

Welcome back to the land of the living, Mister McClain, we hope you enjoy your stay.


	9. Chapter Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Okay Payton, try and average every chapter to about 4k words, that way you'll be able to get them out in good time."  
> "I want this one to be 10k"  
> "Payton, no-"  
> "10k"

“So… This is nice.” Lance chuckled nervously. Wadding his feet through the thick undergrowth of brown roots and yellow leaves scattered across the ground. A few steps in front of him was a stomping Blade of the Marmora who radiated an aura of irritation that Lance could feel aimed right at him.

“Shut up, Lance.”

“Two bros… Walking in a purple forest… Covered in goo.”

“I already told you that I am, officially, ignoring you for the rest of forever for that move you pulled back there.” Keith grumbled back, his own feet squelching with every step he took.

Lance couldn't help but smile at Keith's poor hair, a bigger mess than usual. “It was pretty cool though. I mean, I'm not one to toot my own trumpet-”

“Yes you are-”

“But that might have been the coolest move anyone has ever pulled.”

“You failed.”

“Subjectively.” Lance shrugged.

“Literally. You  _ literally _ fell backwards and failed because your big clown feet got caught on a rock and you tripped.”

“Once I get this goo off you’ll never be able to prove it.”

“Your infamous stupidity is proof enough.”

Yeah, fine, so maybe Lance had failed. Maybe he had been trying to show off but it had all gone quite badly and Keith had to suffer the consequences just as much as Lance did. Maybe that was true. But who doesn’t like a little bit of adventure?

Okay, rewind. A lot had gone on so far today, so much in fact that it was probably best to just start from the beginning. After the mission briefing, when Shiro had bid everyone goodbye for the evening before returning to Lotors cell most likely for more information, the group all went their separate ways to prepare for their own missions.

Pidge had been tasked to visit her brother at the rebel base and deliver the tainted quintessence with Allura joining her, Allura had already performed multiple tests on the substance but had come up with nothing mindblowing so was delivering it to the rebels for their safekeeping. Shiro was on home guard, still not feeling comfortable leaving Lotor to his own devices for too long, while Hunk was on stock checking. Stock was Hunk’s speciality seeing as the guy was the main one who would use stock for his meals and cooking habits so it seemed wise using his system to check things. That just left Lance and Keith to go… shopping. 

Lance was fine. Totally fine. He totally wasn't freaking out about the fact that Keith hadn't stopped glaring at him since Shiro had announced that the two were now a buy one get one free Red Paladin meal deal.

Emphasis on the meal because Lance was too high maintenance to be just a snack… as was Keith.

Thus the two, with not much else to do while they waited, followed Hunk down into the stock room while he began writing down ingredients and materials that the castle was running low on. 

“You guys are lucky being able to go down to the planet surface.” Hunk mumbled after a few minutes, as he began sifting through crates and writing small notes down on the paper in his hand.. “I mean, today is fine, I have some things to do today, but I’ve been practically begging Shiro all week to just let me get some fresh air or something.”

“Hunk, are you telling me that being confined on one ship where we’re only really allowed in about a half a dozen rooms has you feeling cooped up?” Lance chuckled, choosing himself to just sit on an unopened crate while he waited for his best friend to do his thing, Keith sat down himself on the floor a few metres away but he didn’t seem discontent about the matter. “I’m surprised at you. You’re usually the nesting one.”

“That’s you and you know it.” Hunk snorted before disappearing out of sight behind a large shelving unit. “You guys know that I’m usually fine, if I’m bored, I cook, if I’m really bored, I science. But lately, it feels like I’m just not finding anything to do with my time that means anything. Take this week for example, I can’t think of one meaningful thing that I’ve done since you went into the cryopod, Lance.”

“Well that’s different.” Lance raised his voice a little as he could tell as Hunk was speaking that he was going deeper and deeper into the room, making it almost difficult for Lance to hear him. “I was in the pod. You were probably worried about me a little bit so didn’t know what to do with yourself.”

“I was very worried.” Hunk called back. “If I lose you, then who the hell is going to raise these 5 kids with me that you’re so sure we’re going to adopt?”

Lance felt a full belly laugh release from his mouth as he thought back to the garrison when Hunk and Lance had agreed that if the two of them weren’t married by the time they were 40 that the two would adopt 4 or 5 children together and move somewhere in Europe, preferably Portugal or Spain, to raise them. “Well… I’m sure Allura would help you, she’s got that strict maternal instinct in her, she could probably take them on the weekends if you were feeling overworked.”

“Okay but what do I tell them when they ask where their papa is? I can’t do that to them, Lance!” Hunk called out melodramatically, he knew that Lance liked it when they played little games like this. “Their little faces just wouldn’t be able to take it, nor would I, I’d be heartbroken, Lance.”

“Well obviously, You’d better be heartbroken if I die otherwise-”

“Okay, can you guys shut up?” The third voice in the room suddenly snapped. “You guys are getting annoying now- well not you Hunk. Lance didn’t die so can we just get this over with so Lance and I can do this mission already and get home.”

“Someone’s grouchy.” Lance immediately turned to Keith who was glaring down at his lap, it had been a long time since the paladins had hung out like this, maybe Keith was feeling a little left out, to be fair the conversation wasn’t very inclusive of him so he had every right to feel that way if he did. “Fine then Keith, after that little outburst, you get the kids from Wednesday to Friday, you have to feed them good meals since take out night isn’t until Saturday, and that’s Allura's night.”

Hunk gasped from across the room again. “Okay so are these just everyone’s kids now Lance? Voltron babies?”

“You’re damn right, Hunk. Every paladin had a role to play in their upbringing. Keith’s happens to be making sure everyone gets to Dance class.  _ On time,  _ Keith!”

“You’re ridiculous.” Keith mumbled but Lance caught the way his face wasn’t as creased in anger anymore and now seemed a bit more relaxed.

Not long later, Hunk returned with a list in hand which he quickly handed to Keith, obviously just not seeing Lance’s already waiting outstretched hand. 

“That should be everything. Everything vital for sure. If I’ve forgotten anything it just means we can do without it.” Hunk smiled to Lance, holding the list out which Keith was the one to reach forward to take. “But, usual rules, if you see anything funky or anything that smells or even looks like some sort of herb or spice then please get it. I still haven’t found a plant on any of these planets which tastes like oregano.”

“Why would we even need oregano?” Keith frowned, tucking the list into his suit.

“It’s the last ingredient I need to make my Grandmother's famous pizza recipe.” Hunk pouted, before his expression suddenly turned uncharacteristically darker. “And also, Mister Texas, could you pick up some class for yourself on the way back? Oh and a new attitude. Thanks.”

Without another word, Hunk just… left?

Lance turned to Keith in confusion, narrowing his eyes. “What did you do to Hunk?”

Keith glared back immediately. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“You broke him. Why was he suddenly mad at you?”

Keith looked down to the floor, his expression almost looking like shame, but it probably wasn't since Lance wasn't even sure if Keith could express complex emotions like that. Keith's emotional scale went from horny, to hungry, to angry.  With occasional Horngry and Hangry or if Lance was very unlucky a mix of all three. 

“It's not like it's sudden.” Keith muttered but turned to leave before Lance could ask what he meant.

Lance frowned at Keith’s words but immediately followed after him, having to almost jog to keep up with Keith’s large, quick steps away from the pantry.

Once Lance was able to catch up, the two remained in a somewhat uncomfortable silence all the way to Red’s hangar before they finally climbed in, Red immediately closing her mouth behind them as the two entered the cockpit together. 

As was normal for him, Lance didn’t think about his actions before he headed towards the pilots seat just as he normally would, y’know, since it was his lion and he was the pilot after all, when all of a sudden he was pushed back, completely out of the way, and Keith quickly jumped into the chair.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Lance stood back up and growled as he caught sight of Keith getting more comfortable in the seat.

Keith gave him a quick glance, a smug grin across his cheeks. “Driving.”

“I don’t think so, Billy Ray Snide-rus. Move out of the way.” Lance gawped back.

Keith raised an eyebrow as Red immediately responded to her previous paladin and pulled the seat closer to the dashboard, lighting up immediately. “No. You always crash into stuff, I haven’t driven Red in so long, she probably needs a… softer touch.”

“You can touch her softly when we get back, for now, get the hell out of my seat.”

“I’ll make a deal with you.” Keith smirked. “I drive her down. You can drive her back.”

Lance growled, throwing his hands up in exasperation but sitting himself down on the floor nevertheless. Keith wouldn’t let Lance drive Red back, he was just saying it so Lance would just shut up, Lance wasn’t stupid after all.

But still, the way Red had just immediately responded to Keith, barely even pausing to think about it before immediately pulling him up to the driver's seat. It sent bad vibes through Lance’s entire body that he couldn’t shake for the entire take off sequence as Keith lifted Red into the air and shot her out of the castleship like a bullet, heading down to the surface below.

Keith drove like a pro, a soft smile on his face as he goaded Red into a slow barrel roll, a quick jerk to the left, a sharp turn to the right. He was playing with her, testing her out.

He looked happy to be back in his seat.

Lance shook his head, as if trying to shake the bad thoughts from his head. He’d taken this from Keith, Red was his lion and you didn’t have to be a genius to see how much Keith had missed her, they were one in the same after all.

Assholes.

Or impulsive, hot-headed and heavily reliant on their instincts. 

Whatever you prefer. Lance prefered assholes.

No wonder Red hadn’t even questioned it when Keith was in the driver's seat, she’s probably been waiting for him to return this entire time. Just as Lance had feared these last few months, she was just waiting for her true paladin to return. Lance couldn’t match up to Keith, he was nothing like Red at all. 

Lance hated relying on his instincts, if anything Lance has always had the worst instincts of anyone on this team. He’s a terrible judge of character, he caves under pressure, he’s slow to make decisions. He’s not particularly hot-headed either, unless it was Keith, usually Lance was always the cool and collected one if he could help it. Always trying to reason his way out of things. Impulsive? Lance? Not in this universe.

Lance was just a backup driver at the end of the day. Red knew that forming Voltron was the only thing that truly mattered and if she had to deal with a wuss like Lance then she would do that. For the time being. Until her true paladin came back to her. Just like now. 

“You okay?” A voice suddenly broke through the darkness of Lance’s mind. 

Lance looked up in surprise to see Keith staring at him over the side of his seat. 

“Fine.”

“I asked you a question and you didn’t answer. Are you really that mad that I’m driving Red?”

Lance paused, looking down at his lap in shame. “No. It’s fine. Keep driving, Samurai.”

“Fine.”

For the rest of the journey, which wasn’t exactly long, the two remained in absolute silence. The only sound that could be heard was Red’s soft purring, Lance could see by the way that Keith’s expression kept changing that the two were clearing talking to one another through their telepathic bond. Lance tried his best to keep the dark thoughts from returning, but it was almost impossible. 

It was only when Keith finally touched Red’s paws down to the floor that Lance felt himself begin to calm down, slightly.

“We will leave Red here.” Keith mumbled, his chair backing away from the console as he spoke. “I doubt there will be anywhere to land her closer to the village.”

Lance nodded in understanding but snarked nevertheless. “You even going to look?”

“And waste time? No I’m good.” Keith smiled in what almost seemed a challenge but Lance didn’t rise up to it. Standing to his feet and leaving Red without a passing goodbye thought to her as he left.

“Lance, wait!” Keith suddenly called before Lance felt a hand on his shoulder, turning him back before he could step off Red’s platform down onto the planet’s surface.

“What?”

“You are mad that I drove her.” Keith stated rather than asked, his hand staying on Lance’s shoulder to prevent him from turning away again. “Fine. If it’s that big a deal, I won’t do it again. Happy?”

Lance rolled his eyes, pulling out of Keith’s grip instantly and turning away. “Whatever, Keith. Do what you want.”

“Lance!” Keith growled, reaching for him again. “I’m sorry okay. I forgot you were so touchy about your lions. I just missed flying. I haven’t piloted a damn thing since I left the team in the first place. Forgive me if I just wanted to feel it again.”

Lance immediately deflated at Keith’s words, Lance’s anger had only come from his pride being wounded, that he wasn’t the true paladin of any lion anymore. As he let that feeling sink in, he imagined that Keith must have been feeling pretty much the same thing. Forced to leave the lion he did want, same as Lance was, and then only to be pushed out by the Black lion too when her true paladin returned. Perhaps Lance and Keith weren’t so different either. 

“I’m not mad at you, Keith.” Lance whimpered. “Sorry for acting like an ass.”

Keith blinked in surprise, his irritated expression melting into something slightly softer, mostly shocked. “O-Oh. Right. Good. Ass.”

Lance nodded his head, immediately pushing the bad thoughts away like the little demons they are into the very corner of his mind. He can deal with those when he’s eventually left alone with his thoughts and they come out to eat him alive.

Otherwise known as Future-Lance’s problem.

So the two headed off, completely letting go of the short conversation they’d just had. Lance let Keith walk on ahead with his bayard out as they made their way through the lush forested planet they’d laid their feet upon. 

Lance was surprised that Shiro had just given Keith his bayard while Keith was back, saying that he “didn’t need it in combat anyway.” Which, shouldn’t really be that surprising giving the elephant in the room, or dangerous, still-not-fully-understood Galran mechanical prosthetic arm, whatever you wanna call it. 

Still, the planet was beautiful. Somewhat Earth-like which were always Lance’s favourite. Lance loved exploring when he was a kid and the forest they were walking through now reminded him heavily of the forest on the edge of his Grandfather’s land back when he still used to live in Oregon before moving back to Cuba with his Grandma.

Well, if he had been wearing colour changing glasses, since back home, trees weren’t purple with Sunflower yellow leaves. But the thickness of it, wading through where the leaves would tickle his cheeks as he walked through them, that stuck a big old Nostalgia knife into Lance’s chest that made him swell.

He missed his Grandparents a lot, both sets of course, but the Grandparents who moved from Oregon and back to Cuba especially. They were on his Father’s side and had moved to the US when Lance’s Mother popped out Lance’s older brother. Originally, they lived in Florida, as did Lance’s parents when they were first married, but eventually the family began to drift Northwards. With Lance’s Grandparents eventually making their way to Western Oregon to buy a farm and Lance’s family moving closer Northern Colorado so Lance and his siblings had good access to schools. Exhibit A being the Galaxy Garrison since that was across in Arizona. 

Lance wondered if maybe his parents had moved back to Cuba yet. They always said that they would, when all the kids grew up. Lance was second youngest, followed shortly (accidently more like) by Veronica and she had to be, nearly seventeen? Passed seventeen. To think that Roni was at that Dancing Queen age now and Lance couldn’t make the same joke he made when all his siblings, and he himself, hit that age sat heavy on his heart.

Marco probably would have made it for him. Marco was a joke stealing monster. 

Who he missed.

A lot.

He missed all of them. 

Lance let his mind wander, it was obvious that Keith wasn’t going to talk to him for the entirity of the walk (the sour-Sid) so Lance just let himself enjoy the thoughts of his family, old memories and some that weren’t too long before Lance had left them forever. He tried to remember each family member in detail, the structure of their face, the curls in their hair (A McClain hand-me-down, one of many) the way they talked, some with thicker accents than others, they way they smiled when they were happy.

Perhaps an hour had passed, maybe more, and Lance had finally worked his way through his family from uncles, aunts, cousins, grandparents, siblings to his parents, ending on his mother. A short woman who’s face gave away every hardship she’d overcome, her accent was one of the thickest in her family, refusing to give up her Cuban roots and try to fit in with American culture like her husband had, like her children had been brought up in. She was, as you’d expect, the authoritarian but also the care-giver. If you were in Mama’s good books, then you could want for nothing, you were showered in love and affection, but if you were in the bad books, which Lance had to admit to being more times than most of his siblings, then prepare yourself.

Hell hath no fury like Mama McClain.

That is how the saying goes right? 

Lance had never been  _ bad _ , he’d maybe, possibly, been a bit clueless and a bit naive on occasion. Sometimes, maybe, accidently, missing his curfew by like a couple of minutes… or hours. Or maybe picking on Veronica a little too much. Or not doing his chores and being caught trying to blame Luis for it even though Luis was like 8 years older than him, technically a young adult when Lance first started trying to blame him for it. 

Mama had always loved him though, made sure he was happy, getting enough to eat, keeping an eye on every aspect of his health. Helping him when he was stressed, holding him when he was heartbroken. 

Of all his family, not that Lance likes to play favourites, but if he could only see one person of his family again in his life and never be able to see the rest of them. He’d probably choose his Ma.

“Lance.” A voice suddenly broke through his thoughts, shaking him from his almost slip back into the darklands. “That must be it.”

Lance shook his head, shaking those memories away for now, and jogged to catch up with his fellow paladin and looked ahead. He almost deflated at the town ahead of them which almost looked… Primitive.

“That? Are you sure that’s not like some backroads town like that place in Cars the Movie? This can’t be one of their major cities.”

“Pidge gave me the coordinates earlier. You wanna take your concerns up with her?”

“... No.” Lance grumbled back stubbornly. “Fine. Let’s pay good old Radiator Springs a visit I guess.”

The two entered the town, hoping to just pick up the supplies they needed and head back to Red. But, like most things, it couldn’t be that easy. 

Turns out the town they had entered only had one single alien that could understand a word that Keith and Lance were saying (and Lance didn’t even want to start on how long it took for the pair of them to figure that out and find said alien) due to only possessing one translator in the entire town.

And then! It turned out that the town had no spare reserves going out the moment due to the fact that they were going through their winter. Lance had found it rather hot on the surface so he did not want to know what counted as their summer. 

And finally, it turned out that the main city of the planet, the capital, was literally the same amount of distance they’d walked from Red but in the opposite direction and would likely have everything that they need and be willing to trade with the paladins of Voltron.

So, the two headed back to Red and followed the translators suggestion of going to the main village. Well, they were heading back but only a few dobashes after they began their return back to Red something on the way suddenly caught Lance’s eye. 

“Ooh!” Lance squealed like an excited child, running towards what he had seen. “An orange pond!”

Lance didn’t even pause before dropping to his knees at the water side and scooping the liquid with his hands. 

“Not like any pond I’ve ever seen.” Keith scoffed, following up behind him. 

“Well duh. It’s orange.” Lance scoffed but to be honest, it wasn’t just the colour. As he scooped up what he thought had been water in his hand, it was actually a lot thicker, more like a goo substance, similar to maybe a yogurt or a thick milkshake. 

“Eat it.”

Lance looked back over his shoulder to Keith who was smirking down at him. “I’m not going to eat it.”

“You should eat it.” Keith leaned forward, over Lance’s shoulder just as he turned back to watch as Lance played with the gross substance. “Pidge would want you to. For science.”

“ _ You _ eat it.”

“I’m busy. I’m observing.”

“Observe yourself going away somewhere away from me, would you?”

“Fine. Play with your goo. I’m going to go get Red and actually finish this mission since you’re boring.”

“I’m boring ‘cause I won’t eat the goo?”

“Yes.”

Keith straigtened up again and was about to walk away when Lance saw him stop at the corner of his eye and lift his arm to point. “What’s that?”

Lance looked up, following the direction of Keith’s pointer and saw what he must have been talking about, a small tree hunched at the edge of the pond, leaning slightly overtop of it but connected and hanging down from one of it’s biggest branches was something that- almost resembled a rope?

“A jump swing?” Lance frowned, standing to his feet before jumping in excitement. “Oh yes! Keith, wait here! I’m going to show you something totally amazing.”

“You’re not going to jump the pond, are yo-”

“I’m going to jump the pond!” Lance screeched back, taking into a run across the perimeter of the pond until he reached the rope, dancing just in Lance’s reach. “I used to do this all the time with my brothers and they both knew that I was the best at it. I just to jump the pond on my Grandfather’s farm all the time. I’m pretty sure, Keith, that I’m a pro at this by now.”

“Lance, I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Nej-sayers grey first, Keithy boy. I’d keep that in mind if I were you. I don’t think you could pull off the silver fox look.” Lance waved his hand in dismissal before stepping back as far as the rope would let him, his hands holding tight. 

Lance looked across the pond, calculating his attack, if he just built up enough speed, jumped enough from the bank and didn’t let go too soon at the other end, this was a piece of cake, and Lance’s mother didn’t call him a “clever boy” all those years for nothing. 

“Watch these sick tricks!” Lance called out, grabbing tighter hold of the rope and immediately rushing forward to the bank of the water, keeping his grip locked, and then he pounced, both feet waving farewell to the ground as he sailed through the hot summer air. Lance fluttered across the pond gracefully, his feet slightly touching the liquid and getting it stuck on his shoes but it was no problem when he closed in on the other side where Keith was waiting, arms crossed over his chest.

“Incoming; Sex bomb in Blue.” Lance yodelled as he released his grip on the rope and rocketed his body the remaining distance, for a moment, Lance allowed pride to well up inside him as for just a second he thought he’d done it, he’d watched his feet pass the barriers of the pond and just about land on the bank. 

But, Lance didn’t take into consideration that he’s not the most… Balanced individual.

Immediately after landing, his knees buckled and he took a step back to try and steady himself, when suddenly his foot caught on something hard and he felt himself falling. He reached out to grab whatever he could with his hands, the only available object was Keith who had realised Lance’s error and was currently reaching for him. Lance grabbed at Keith’s outstretched hand, holding it tight as he continued to fall backwards.

It was like a slow motion movie, when he clung to Keith, he thought he could feel relief but he had the terror of watching Keith’s expression change from worry to down right fear as he suddenly followed after Lance until the two tumbled backwards.

And into the pond. 

For a bystander, it might have looked like the pond had eaten the two boys and that they would never be seen again as for a few moments, the goo settled and the planet was still. That is until Lance burst through the surface again, like Ariel from the Little Fucking Mermaid, and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Holy shit!” Lance screeched in delight, the cool goo actually helped giving how hot the rest of the planet was. “That was so cool. Keith, I wanna do that again, come on let’s go!”

Just as he had spoke, Lucifer himself rose from the goo like the second reckoning and glared hard at Lance, who immediately burst into laughter at the sight of him. 

The poor guys mullet was pinned down against his head, and the goo being as thick as it was curled over his head like a ginger afro that Keith did  _ not  _ suit whatsoever.

“Lance.” Keith whispered, the warning in his tone obvious.

Lance couldn’t stop his laughter, he felt lightheaded from how little oxygen he was bringing in as he just stared at his friend. “Keith, you look beautiful. Who was it that did your hair? I so have to have their number, man.”

Immediately, like a bomb, Keith went off. Grabbing handfuls of goo and throwing them at Lance’s face as he tried his best to waddle his way towards the bank of the water and climb up.

“That’s it, Lance. I am officially removing your existence from my brain!” Keith snarled, crawling out of the water, purposefully kicking his foot out to knock Lance back in. “You are nothing more than a gust of wind to me now, McClain.”

Lance quickly resurfaced, laughing as he once again scraped the orange substance from his hair. “Y’know for a Scorpio, you have absolutely no chill.”

“If I die from some sort of poisoning from that pond I am totally coming back just to haunt your dumb ass.” Keith stood to his feet, looking like an angry cat with his back hunched up, desperately trying to scrap the goo from his body. 

“Umm… Newsflash Keith, if you die from poisoning so will I, in fact I’ll die first, I’m still in it.”

“Get out, you moron!” Keith immediately made his way back as Lance made his way to the bank himself only to have his shoulder grabbed by Keith and be practically yanked from the pond and thrown to the ground. 

Lance couldn’t stop laughing as Keith immediately fretted over him, wiping away the goo from around his mouth, nose, eyes and ears before then pulling Lance up to his feet and shoving him lightly.

“You are such a freaking idiot, I swear to god, if your own idiocy doesn’t kill you, I will.”

“Ahh Keith.” Lance giggled mockingly, following after his buddy as Keith immediately turned to leave. “You care about me so much!”

“I hate you, I hate everything about you. You are so annoying. Why did I come down here with you?”

“Because you don’t hate me, Keith!” Lance sang before raising his voice to a shout. “Hello, World! Keith Kogane, former Red and Black paladin, current Blade of Marmora member doesn’t hate me! He doesn’t hate me, I tell you!”

Keith growled and moved faster away, Lance could do nothing but chuckle and run to catch up with him. 

Some time passed and the two continued making their way through the forest, bickering and teasing mostly but also talking between themselves until Keith turned back with to Lance with a role of his eyes, his face twisting at the feeling of the goo squelching and moving with him.

“Your infamous stupidity is proof enough.” Keith snided. “For fuck sake, Lance, I can feel this goo soaking through my armour and into my underwear. This is your fault.”

Lance immediately burst out laughing again, having to pause walking to grab at his stomach as he heaved and panted between his laughs.

“Look at this mess, Lance!” Keith stopped to look as best as he could around himself, sure enough the goo had piled at the corners of his area, so much goo that even though some must have melted through the paladin suit there was still an orange coating that if anyone else saw Keith, they’d think the paladin suit was actually orange rather than black.

Lance didn’t even disguise the fact that he was just staring blatantly at Keith’s perfectly- goo covered, yes- peachy ass. 

“Are you a baker?” Lance smirked.

“What? No I’m not baker, what are you-”

“‘Cause you got some nice buns.”

“What do you- Lance! Are you kidding me? Stop staring at my ass!”

Lance giggled like a school boy, proud of his amazing line but also proud of the immediate shade of red that blossomed on Keith’s cheeks, perfectly matching the orange everywhere else.

“Wait!” Lance snorted before Keith could run off again. “I have more. Okay, ready? Sweetie you’ve got something on your butt.”

“I know, it’s goo, you-”

“My eyes.”

Keith’s face blanked immediately. “I actually can’t stand you.”

“Dude these are some of my best okay. Alright one more, one more, and this one is my favourite.”

“Please, set yourself on fire and burn.”

Lance jumped forward, wrapping his arm around Keith’s shoulder and pulling him in tight. “-Damn, boy, was that suit on sale? Because I’d love to see 100% off”

Lance was ready to laugh his head off, Keith obviously a blushing bumbling mess but instead of what he thought… Keith paused and looked down at his feet. “I- I don’t get it.”

Lance widened his eyes. “Of course you get it!”

“No.” Keith gulped. “Explain that one.”

“Y’know-” Lance immediately blushed, he’d never had to explain a joke before. “On sale, 100% off… But it’s… Also a double meaning… Like 100% off, taken off, not wearing the suit… Naked.”

“Oh.” Keith looked up at him, smiling softly. 

“Y-You get it now?”

“Oh I understood it to begin with.” Keith face morphed into one of mischief. “I just wanted to see you squirm explaining it.”

“Why would you do that?” Lance gawped, releasing his grip as Keith walked away.

“Well… I gave you too much credit.” Keith shrugged as Lance made his way to catch up, walking side by side with his fellow paladin. “I was hoping you would realise that you coming on to me and using those sorts of lines is literally useless given the fact that we’ve slept together dozens of times, have seen each naked more than that, and you are well aware that I was given this suit and didn’t actually purchase it myself from a store.” 

Lance cheeks immediately darkened, he stopped walking to let Keith go on ahead as he lagged behind, deflated that his lines had gone uncelebrated. “That’s the point you end with?”

The two drifted off into silence as they continued to wade their way through the thick forest, Keith still ploughing on ahead with his bayard ready, cutting at any and all branches that he could reach, even those that weren’t even in his walking path.

Lance watched him cautiously, trying to avoid his eyes from drifting down at staring at Keith’s thick thighs that continued to tense and almost jiggle as he took his deep steps forward. Lance was a weak man, when he liked someone he couldn’t help but think of them in lustful ways, but Lance had promised to stop that. To see Keith as nothing more than a friend.

Kinda hard when it was Keith bringing up their saucy past.

Lance hadn’t thought about Keith in that way once since the mission had began but now it was the only thing he could think about as walked. Memories of Keith’s thighs wrapped around his head, others of Keith’s beautiful buttocks raised as if on display in Lance’s bed, more of Keith above him, pushing himself between Lance’s own thighs, leaning down to press his lips to Lance’s chest, sometimes using his teeth and nails to make Lance’s skin crawl.

Lance groaned aloud causing Keith to turn back with a confused look, but Lance just turned away as if suddenly interested in something to his left until Keith turned back to his front again and continued walking.

Maybe 15 more minutes passed of silence and Lance couldn’t take it anymore, his mind felt as gooey as the rest of him. He was overheated, tired, embarrassed and just wanted to climb into his mind like the hermit he is and maybe die a little bit for a few hours so he could forget all about Keith and his dumb mullet headed, bluntness. 

“I’m tired!” Lance whined. “I don’t want to walk anymore.”

“Why don’t you just call Red to come pick us up?” Keith cocked his head back in his direction. “I was wondering why you hadn’t just been lazy and done that yet.”

Lance looked forward at him, an eyebrow raised in skepticism. “Because she doesn’t do that?”

“Yes, she does.” Keith stopped, waiting for Lance to catch up. “How do you think she came and got me all those times? Don’t tell her I said this, but she acts like a taxi.”

“Well you would know. Sadly, Red had never came to  _ pick me up _ .” Lance ended his sentence in a low voice, a failed attempt at impersonating Keith’s usual tone. 

“What? Are you guys not that close then? Surprising, since she picked you as her paladin.”

“Listen Keith, as nice as it is to talk about my handmedowns, can we just accept the fact that I can’t understand your lion and move on?”

“Wait. You can’t even understand her?!” Keith suddenly gawped. “Wait, how? What do you mean by that?”

Lance sighed in irritation, wondering how this conversation had even come up, the two had stopped in the middle of the forest, not even heading towards the Red lion anymore when really it’s what Keith was bickering about anyway. “No, I just- I can’t understand her. She doesn’t talk to me like Blue used to. She doesn’t send me pictures or scenes or anything like that, she just ignores me most of the time.”

Keith regarded Lance strangely from a moment before rolling his eyes. “You’re such an idiot, Lance. That’s not how Red communicates, did you even give her a chance? Or are you just still acting like a petulant child because Blue kicked you out?”

Lance jolted in surprise before snarling at his fellow paladin. “You know what, fuck you, Keith. Find your own way back.”

Without another word, Lance immediately turned at a 90 degree angle and started heading in that direction instead, away from Keith who immediately groaned and began to follow after him.

Lance increased his pace, he was taller after all especially in the legs, so when he wanted to be fast and out-pace Keith, he really could. 

“Lance, I didn’t mean it. Slow down.” Keith growled struggling to keep up. “I didn’t mean that about Blue.”

“Well you said it.” Lance snarked back.

“Well… Can you blame me for being annoyed at you?” Keith sounded exasperated but it was what he had said that forced Lance to stop, turn around, and have to hold himself back from pushing Keith over so that the leaves stuck to his gooey body and he’d have to walk home looking like some sort of nature monster.

“Pray tell, dear Keith, why have thou decided to be annoyed at me?”

Keith growled at the comment but explained nonetheless. “I left Red to you, I gave her to you. She’s your responsibility as much as you are hers, and you’re telling me she’s had no one to talk to these last few months because you don’t understand her?”

“We’re just not… bonded like that!” Lance held his hands up, it wasn’t his fault. “Blue made it so easy, she just always fed me images of where we had to go, or memories to show me how she was feeling. Red has never even tried to do that.”

“Because that’s not how Red speaks.” Keith growled, rubbing at his temples. “She doesn’t feed images to your brain, why would she? Red and I used to talk through colours, that’s how she expresses herself and how her and I were able to bond so close.”

“Yeah well… She’s never shown me any colours either so my point proven, your lion doesn’t like me and doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“You’re telling me she’s never fed any colours into your brain while you’ve been flying her. Like red for danger, or white for safety. Or ocean blue to say we’re going home.” Keith rolled his eyes disbelievingly, folding his arms across his chest in his signature move.

“Hell if you wanna write me a cheat sheet, Keith, that’d be handy. At least I can be prepared if she ever does.”

“There’s no cheat sheet. When she would talk to me, I would immediately know what the colour meant. It didn’t need explaining or remembering, I just always knew.”

Lance turned away in irritation, he didn’t want to have this conversation anymore, it was getting the pair of them nowhere. “Oh well goodo. That’s not how it is with me. Now hurry up. The goo has started to seep into my underwear now. I just wanna get these supplies and go home.”

For the rest of the journey back, Lance led the way. Rather than cutting down branches he crawled and maneuvered his way through them, letting Keith take all the backlash as branches would whip back against his body.

Lance would’ve teased the boy if he was still in the mood but the talk about Red had left a sour taste in his mouth and had brought back Lance’s dark feelings from earlier. 

Red didn’t want to have a relationship with Lance, not when she knew her true paladin was still around and still wanted her as much as she wanted him. Lance was nothing more than a spare part, that was why she had never reached out to him. Sure, Lance can admit that he hasn’t been the most welcoming either, he misses his Lady in Blue, his ocean home, his baby mama, so when he was forced to pilot Red all those months ago, was he hostile? Maybe but he had tried since then, tried to get to know Red but she just wasn’t interested in doing the same with him. 

She’s not his afterall. She will always be Keith’s lion, that’s why she was so quick to welcome him back this morning. No stutter as if to ask where Lance is, no pause to recalibrate herself to Keith’s method of piloting. No. The switch back was immediate. Like returning to factory settings. 

Not long later, the two arrived back at Red’s feet and began to climb aboard. They weren’t about to walk another hour to get to the main town, both paladins knew they’d rather just fly Red over, land her closer, grab the supplies and go home.

“You can drive.” Lance mumbled as he entered the cockpit.

“No thanks.” Keith turned away. “I’ve had my turn.”

“Fine.” Lance shrugged back uninterested before perching uncomfortably at the edge of his seat, as if his reluctance might trigger Keith to change his mind and replace Lance again, or maybe Red could knock him out the seat by throwing the chair forward so Lance fell out. Either one.

But nothing, Red slowly pulled him forward towards the controls and lit up as she normally would with him.

Lance slowly grabbed at the control sticks and pushed up, for a second Red didn’t respond but after a moment or two to collect herself she must have realised that her false paladin was at the wheel and she herself reluctantly followed his commands and lifted to the air. 

For a few dobashes, she lifted up no problem, slowly than Lance was telling her but he wasn’t about to complain that a lion who wasn’t even his wasn’t following his exact commands. But then, she started acting strangely.

Lance frowned in confusion as Red began to stutter and shift without his say so. 

“What’s she doing?” Keith asked from behind, Lance could feel Keith’s hand grip tighter on the seat as once again Red jolted, swaying left and right and up and down as if she’d been down the pub and had a few too many.

“Does she need a fuel top up?” Lance gulped in worry. She’d never done this before so what was she-

Before Lance could think another word, Red suddenly soared upwards in the air without Lance’s say so, barrell rolling as she went so fast and hard that Lance reached a hand back over his head to grab at Keith’s shoulders just to make sure he didn’t go flying but he was fine just clinging to Lance’s chair for dear life.

“Lance!” He called out. “What are you doing?!”

“It’s not me!” Lance screamed back, using his one free hand to desperately try and tell Red to stop spinning, but she wouldn’t listen and after a few more seconds of screaming and browning his paladin suit, Red cut through the atmosphere before slowing. Slowing down. Slowing until… She stopped, her engines went dead and she began to fall backwards, the pull of the planets gravity dragging her back through the clouds and towards the planet surface at top speed.

“Your lion is going to kill us!” Lance screamed.

“My lion?! She’s yours! Do something!” 

The two continued to scream as Red continued to fall through the atmosphere, the heat in the cockpit was quickly rising as Lance tried again and again to retake control. Lance reached and pressed every button he could think of until finally the cockpit lit up again with colour. 

Lance immediately went to correct them but Red didn’t respond, all Lance could feel was her growling growing louder and louder in his ear. He didn’t know what to do, nothing was working, he’d have to get out of Keith’s way so Keith could fix this. Keith  _ could  _ fix this.

Red’s growling increased in volume again until Lance had to rip his arm from Keith’s shoulder to cover one of his ears, but the growling wasn’t aloud, it was in his mind, no covering of his ears could stop the loud, gut wrenching sound escape from the little bond Red and Lance had. 

“Listen to her, Lance.” Keith growled, tensing his grip on the chair tightly since he’d lost Lance’s hold. “She’s trying to tell you something.”

“It’s not like I’m not trying!” Lance snapped back.

Lance clutched at the controls as he felt his link with Red getting weaker and weaker, he was losing his connection completely, why wasn’t she working? Why wasn’t she  _ working _ ?! 

“Lance.” Keith’s voice was softer, Lance tried to focus on controlling but he suddenly felt a soft touch on his shoulder, then another on his other shoulder, slowly circling down his arms and back up again. The touch was so gentle as it rolled down his body like a wave before coming up, along his neck and across his jawline, then back and resting on his cheeks. “Lance.”

Lance whimpered as the hands moved until they circled around his eyes, forcing him to close them leaving him in blackness.

“Listen. Lance.” The voice whispered softly to his ears, he could feel soft breaths against his ear and neck that seemed to ground him in his seat. “She needs you.”

The words were like healing medicine, Lance immediately felt his heart rate begin to slow, taking his time to breath in and out and softening his grip on the controls, just allowing himself to feel what was around him. The soft touches on his face, the rumbling underneath his feet. Lance perhaps couldn’t see much more than darkness, but he could feel so much more.

A few moments later, the darkness began to shift, as if lightening. Lance almost wanted to crawl away from the approaching light but he didn’t when he felt a feather light touch against his ear, so light that he almost thought he’d imagined it. But he knew he hadn’t. 

Keith. 

As if summoned, the colours in his mind changed again. Flashing lighter and lighter and lighter until Lance could make it out. Flashing violet, over and over again in his head.

Soon the violet was all he could see and think of, as well as the overwhelming sense of calm it seemed to wash over his body, calming his heart and slowing his thoughts until he could finally see. His vision changed and suddenly he was looking through his own eyes, he was seeing through Reds. He watched her tumble, closing in on the ground and immediately Lance kicked into high gear, twisting the controls in his hand, pushing upwards against the thrusters so Red twisted onto her front, using the thrusters on her feet to stop her fall. It took a few moments to slow her speed down from what it was but she slowed down, slower and slower until she slowed to a stop, her feet scraping against the tops of trees before Lance sent her forward.

“Lance…” The voice from before returned. Lance felt the touch around his eyes leave him and he blinked them open, the harsh light of Red’s cockpit causing him to squint but after a second his vision refocused and he was back inside. Slowly and smoothly guiding Red forward.

“I-I did it.” Lance gawped as he looked around, he turned behind him to see Keith smiling down at him, almost proud looking before he reached a hand forward and ran it through Lance’s sticky hair. 

“Yeah, Sharpshooter. You sure did.”

“I wanna loop-de-loop.”

“Just land the damn Lion.”

Thankfully, the rest of the mission went off without a hitch. Lance piloted Red closer to the main town, able to find a clear landing area just a ten minute walk out. When they entered, more translators approached them and spoke to them of their troubles in the previous town and their lives as Paladins. It was nice. They didn’t even mention the fact that Keith and Lance were both dripping goo all over their marble like floors.

It was also particularly nice to watch Keith squirm when the aliens kept trying to kill his knees. Apparently on this planet it was a sign of respect to kiss the knees of those above you. Lance had been the perfect gentlemen, accepted the kiss and then surprised everyone by leaning down to kiss the knees of some himself. He wasn’t about to argue with someone’s culture which it looked like Keith really wanted to.

“Keith. Look.” Lance smirked, slowly going to his own knees and leaning to kiss Keith’s quacking knees. “Sign of respect.”

“S-Screw you.”

After they collected everything on their list that the residents had, as well as some kind gifts from some as well, they headed back to Red. Their hands full of goodies to bring back. Lance had even found some edible plant life that resembled some herbs back on Earth, none of them smelt like Oregano as far as Lance could smell but he was sure Hunk could have some fun experimenting with them. 

They made their way back to Red and Lance offered his seat to Keith freely. Making up some excuse that “someone with muscles should make sure that the supplies don’t go flying everywhere” but really he had just wanted to see that smile on Keith’s face again as he piloted. The anxiety in Lance was still there, of course, but he felt a lot better. Red was his just as much as Red was Keith’s, maybe Red played favourites maybe she didn’t but it didn’t change the fact that both of the paladins belonged to their Lion. 

That helped a lot. It especially helped when Red sent him another flash of that violet colour, and just like Keith had explained to him earlier, you didn’t need a cheat sheet. Lance knew that Red was talking about home. 

Lance did actually enjoy the flight back with Keith, he shouldn’t have because Keith was being an ass. Keith intentionally twisted Red left and right, up and down, long barrel rolls that had Lance grabbed for the supplies, trying so hard to keep them secure to the ground, managing to bump his head a few times in the process. Yes, Keith was being a dick. But it was still fun. Shouting profanities at each other as Keith shot Red across space, signalled the castle of their return and having to repeat himself after Lance had struck him with a mango looking fruit they’d received from the planet. 

When they finally entered Red’s hangar, Lance was smiling so hard his cheeks were hurting. For good measure, he threw another fake-mango striking Keith in the side of the head, and then sprinted out of Red when Keith began to chase after him, the same fake-mango as ammunition in his hand.

Outside, the boys ran around like children, throwing the same mango back and forth at each other until one particular bad throw from Keith and good dodge from Lance resulted in the fake-mango splatting against the wall, sticking to it immediately. Juices running down the wall.

“Oops.” Keith muttered.

Lance looked to him with a smirk. “Oops.”

“Shower?” Keith frowned at him.

“Shower.” Lance nodded.

The two immediately took off into a sprint. Lance quickly calling to Hunk through his wrist communicator to tell him about his delivery. I think both Lance and Keith didn’t want to be seen in the mess they were in.

They entered together and Keith immediately began stripping out of his armour, pulling each piece of slowly, Lance could only watch in disgust as orange goo dripped onto the clean floor. But soon his eyes drifted up as Keith began working on his leg armour, taking off his calf armour, then his thigh armour, then his chest.

Lance could only stare, slightly wide eyed, at the good looking boy in front of him. Lance hadn’t noticed the change in Keith’s body before but now, Lance could see that Keith was a lot thicker, his shoulders a lot broader. He wasn’t as stick thin as he used to be. Keith had gone from a 10 to an 11.5, an absolute fittie!

“What are you staring at?” Keith suddenly grumbled, his expression dead pan.

Lance tried to cover himself, rubbing his hand at the back of his neck. “N-Nothing much.”

“You’re staring at me.” Keith mumbled. “Stop that.”

“Well can you blame me?” Lance gasped, absolutely flustered and just faking confidence. “Your ass is so… Square shaped, it’s weird!”

“Square?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve never said that before.”

“Well I never noticed before.”

“Oh really?” Keith raised an eyebrow disbelievingly. “This must be the first time you’ve ever seen it then, right? If you’re only just noticing something as weird as it being square.”

“E-Exactly!”

“Sure.”

Lance gulped but as a thought came to his head he started to smile. “Okay but I’ve thought of another line though. Do you wanna hear it?”

“No, I don’t wan-”

“Baby are you an alien? ‘Cause I can see Uranus.” Lance giggled like a proud school child as he quickly dashed into a cubicle to avoid Keith as he kicked his leg out in Lance’s direction.

“One of these days, Lance.”

“One of these days, what?”

“I’m going to actually kill you and dispose of your body so no one can ever find you again.”

Lance giggled as he quickly stripped from his gross orange paladin armour piece-by-piece and immediately let the hot water cover his body and clean the icky feeling from his body. He listened as Keith too entered the cubicle next to him and stripped the rest of the way out of his paladin suit. 

Lance meticulously cleaned every aspect of his body, every nook and crevice before bending down and cleaning the majority of his armour and his paladin suit while the water dripped down on his hair and back. It was an amazing feeling, better than sex that’s for sure, he couldn’t help a few moans and whimpers escape his throat as a particularly good bit of heat hit him in a particularly good section of his skull.

“I swear to god, Lance if you’re-”

Lance looked up to see Keith peering over the top of his cubicle at him and staring down. The blush on Lance’s cheeks was immediate and he quickly tried to cover himself as he straightened back up.

“What are you doing?!”

“I was making sure you weren’t cranking one out while I was literally stood right next to you.” Keith snarked back but Lance could see the blush on his cheeks as well.

“By literally looking to check! Keith! Where is your sense of privacy man?!”

Keith humphed but finally did turn back to his own cubicle and continue washing his hair. The two remained in silence for the rest of their washing, Lance spending extra time shampooing and oiling his hair to make sure none of that destructive goo remained. Keith surprisingly stayed for a while as well, normally Keith was a quick spritz and go kinda guy when it came to showers but maybe he was being extra careful to get rid of the goo as well as Lance.

But eventually, Lance did step out and he placed his paladin armour down on the drying racks provided and then hung up his suit above it to hopefully dry off over night. He was on mission ban anyway so he wouldn’t be called to arms anytime soon. 

Lance grabbed a pair of boxers from the storage cupboard and pulled them up his leg before returning back to the sink, finding his small array of beauty products on his shelf. He didn’t have much, the problem with being in space, but what he did have he used religiously. Cleanser. Toner. Moisturiser. Oils for his more dry skin. Serums for his more oily skin. Lance was close to finishing when Keith finally stepped from the shower and followed Lance’s routine of hanging up his armour and grabbing a pair of underwear from the storage cupboard. 

When he was finished, he walked over to Lance and sat on one of the sides to watch him as Lance began to layer his final moisturiser up and down his legs.

“Woah.” Keith suddenly gawped.

Lance looked up at me, expecting Keith to be awing at his beauty, but a strange expression was spread across Keith’s cheeks. Somewhat like pity. “What?”

“That scars kinda… big.” Keith gulped, unable to take his eyes from Lance’s bare thigh. “... Did it hurt?”

Lance froze, he had purposefully been avoiding paying attention to the scar given that it was a new part of his body, and not a pretty part at that. He didn’t even really want to acknowledge the fact that his mistake in battle and had a deadly cost to his looks, if Hunk had asked or Pidge or Allura, Lance probably would have changed the subject but the look on Keith’s face… It was pity, obviously, but it wasn’t the sort of pity Lance was used to, a different strand perhaps. Like Keith was angry but not at Lance for his mistake but something else entirely.

“Did getting shot hurt?” Lance raised an eyebrow.

“I-”

Lance sighed and ran his fingers across the pink skin slowly, rubbing the oil over the scar slowly as he himself took in the shape of the scar for the first time. It was probably the size of his palm, jagged at every edge with some further scaring around it. Plus the fact that it was a deep pink from being so new stark against his olive skin.

“This is what happens.” Lance nodded his head, though the scar might be ugly and seem like an imperfection on Lance’s otherwise perfect skin, he was still proud to have it. “This is my proof that I am doing good. That being out here isn’t for nothing. I’m making a difference in the universe. It’s proof that I’m still alive in this war.”

Keith’s seemed to freeze, his breath caught his throat as he stared at Lance who straightened up again and shot Keith a cocky smile.

“Plus, next time I get laid I can totally play myself to be the hero and boom. Hero sex. The best sex.”

Keith stayed quiet for another moment before his head dropped and he let out an unimpressed sigh. “You are such a freaking dork, I can’t believe you.”

“Believe it, honey, I’m one of a kind.” Lance shot back before turning on his heels. “Now, I think it’s time that this queen headed off to get her beauty sleep, this face doesn’t just care for itself y’know.”

Keith snorted before following after Lance, the two left the bathroom and headed down to their rooms, dressed in nothing but the Castles generic boxer shorts as they waddled down the corridors.

They didn’t talk, but Lance didn’t think they had to. The silence was comforting, Lance could still feel Keith’s presence beside him and it wasn’t malicious or unkind or irritated, it was just Keith. Walking beside him. 

It didn’t last of course, they soon turned up to Lance’s door since his room was first with Keith’s being a while further down the corridor. Keith stopped when they reached the door and turned to Lance with a smile.

“Glad to see you’re not totally incapacitated by your injury.” Keith smirked. “I might tell Shiro that putting you on a solo mission ban might be a bad idea.”

“You said might twice.” Lance playfully squinted his eyes. 

“Might.” Keith smirked once more, leaning forward and poking his tongue out.

“Whatever. Goodnight, Keith.”

The door to his bedroom opened behind him and he went to turn away before quickly bumping his hips against Keith, forcing him to stumble and have to catch himself a few paces back.

“Goodnight, idiot.” Keith smiled back evilly, before stepping forward and playfully pushing Lance back until he stumbled into his room, very nearly tripping over his own feet and landing on his face. Maybe Keith was right, maybe he did have big goofy clown feet. 

“Try not to dream about me while you’re sleeping.” Lance jokingly blew kisses out of the open door as Keith rolled his eyes.

“Try not to fall out of bed and break every bone in your body.”

“Such a romantic.”

The door closed after that, leaving Lance with the final sight of Keith smiling kindly back at him, for a minute Lance could forget the malicious relationship they’d had as of late. Today had been good for them, forcing the pair to get along and, gods above, was Lance happy with the result.

Lance stripped down and crawled into bed, not even punishing himself when his thoughts turned to his fellow paladin, letting himself fall asleep to the image of Keith’s smile.


	10. Chapter Ten

Waking up the next morning, Lance felt like a breath of fresh air. It was like the entire ship was just a little bit brighter, his skin was clearer, his hair glossier, and his lips plumper. He was beyond ready to start the day.

The rest of his fellow paladins on the other hand were not. 

When Lance walked into the dining room, dressed down in his favourite silk robe and blue lion slippers which he absolutely refused to hand over to anyone, and his bayard attached to his joggers underneath making him look like a totally sexy badass. He’d expected to see a group of smiling faces welcome him in and wish him a good morning. What actually happened was silence.

Lance wasn’t the first to arrive, he was the second. Only his beautiful best friend Hunk was there, hustling and bustling with plates. Immediately, Lance got to helping, laying out cutlery beside the plates for everyone around the table, Coran and Allura didn’t join the paladins for breakfast usually as Alteans never ate at that time in the morning, the conversation where they’d spoke about this had actually been rather odd. Allura had almost found it repulsive that Humans ate not long after waking from a night’s rest. Each to their own, Lance guessed.

“Two… Three… Four.” Hunk pointed around. “Perfect.”

Lance regarded him strangely for a second before counting the plates himself. “Five, Hunk. There’s five of us.”

Hunk frowned at him for just a second before he realised and instantly went to grab another plate. “I forgot that Keith is back. Since he’s been gone for so long I’d gotten used to laying out just four.”

Lance shrugged his shoulders in understanding and didn’t think any more of it, just layed out the extra cutlery, when he was done. The doors opened again and this time Shiro and Pidge strolled in together. Shiro walking straight with Pidge looking like some sort of small terrier biting at his ankles and barking at him.

“Shiro!” She whined. “Just listen!”

“I don’t listen to people who knock on my door at 3am to tell me of their discoveries when I specifically told them four hours before then to go to bed.” Shiro raised his head to avoid Pidge’s jumping form as she ran around him in circles to get his attention.

“I couldn’t just go to sleep!” Pidge yellowed. “I was on the edge of something amazing and I figured it out!”

“Well done, Pidge. You may speak to me about it after breakfast. Hopefully I’ll have woken up a bit more by then since I’m still tired from my broken sleep last night.”

Pidge groaned but listened to her orders as she walked over to the boys and threw herself into Lance’s arms dramatically. Good thing he was paying attention and was able to catch her.

“Hi.” Hunk smiled down at her as she continued to groan. 

“Guys! Shiro won’t listen to me!” 

“We heard.” Lance chuckled, scooping the child up, she must have been annoyed as she didn’t protest at all to being carried to the table and gently dropped in her seat. Lance placed her down gently and was quickly replaced by Hunk who spooned a large helping of food goo on her plate before reaching into his pot again and adding a little more.

“For our growing child.” He smirked before moving over to Shiro who had taken his seat beside the head of the table. Hunk gave him an extra large helping and then, repeating what he did with Pidge, scooped a little extra on too. “For the angry boy.”

Shiro breathed out a breath of exasperation but thanked Hunk anyway and began to tuck in to his food.

“Lance, sit down, I’ll plate some up for you as well.” Hunk pointed a goo covered spoon at him across the table.

Lance nodded and took his seat beside Pidge, leaving a space empty on his other side for Hunk to sit in. Just as the man himself crossed around and placed a helping onto his plate before walking off.

“Where’s my extra?” Lance pouted.

“You made me collect everything from Red yesterday and put it all away all by myself. Plus, I found the piece of fruit you wasted! Consider this your punishment.”

Lance whined but accepted the deal as he tucked into still a generous helping, not quite enjoying the meal but satisfied with the changes Hunk had made to make it more tasted. It almost had a smoky taste to it, something Hunk had been experimenting with recently as he wanted to replicate the taste of overcooked bacon. 

Lance watched as Hunk carefully placed some food onto his own plate, careful not to get any on the table, before he scooped one more large helping and almost tossed it across the table, roughly squaring it onto Keith’s plate but it had still spluttered onto the table and some of it off the plate itself.

Lance stared at Hunk strangely but the younger man hadn’t seemed to care about his actions at all before placing the bowl of leftover goo in the middle and sitting himself down next to Lance. Barely even a minute later, the doors opened once more and Keith strolled in. He looked a bit of a mess, his hair was all over the place, he was wearing his Blade outfit but it looked like he’d put it on in a rush with it being bunched up in several placed and not stretched over his body completely.

“Sorry.” He gulped as he entered and took his seat next to Shiro. “I overslept.”

“I’ve said it before.” Pidge snorted from Lance’s right side. “The more time you spend with Lance, the more you become like him.”

Lance coughed on his food in surprise as he turned to Pidge with a glare. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Really, Lance? Keith was fine all week for sleeping while you were in the pod, then he spends one day with you and suddenly he’s oversleeping. Even you could do that maths.”

“Rude.” He whimpered.

“To be fair,” Shiro spoke up. “I don’t think Keith was sleeping when Lance was in the pod. He was like you Pidge.”

“A night owl?”

“Disobeying orders of getting a healthy night’s rest.” He shot back. “And disrupting your commanding officer out of hours.”

“That was like… One night.” Keith blushed back. “And it was only like two hours into the night cycle.”

“I was still asleep. I listen to Allura when she says to sleep from 10 o’clock till 6am, the artificial night cycle created for us. According to the National Sleep Foundation, an adult requires between 7 and 9 hours sleep per day in order to promote a healthy lifestyle. Whereas teenagers require 9 to 10 hours due to physical growth and other areas of development.”

“Okay Cosmopolitan.” Pidge rolled her eyes. “And I get that.”

“I don’t think he means passing out in your chair and napping for four hours of the afternoon, or falling asleep at dinner, or staying in bed until after breakfast.” Hunk chuckled softly to her.

“Am I asleep now?” Pidge poked her tongue out. “Do I look like I’ve slept through breakfast?”

“Have you even been to bed yet?” Keith spoke up next with a smirk.

Pidge scoffed and threw her hands up in defeat before getting back to eating her food, muttering to herself how every conversation they ever had ended with her being reprimanded for her “fine-enough” sleeping habits.

She won’t be calling them fine-enough when she’s thirty with wrinkles like an unfortunate fifty year old, begging Lance for his miracle face lift cream, now will she?

The rest of breakfast passed somewhat normally, but Lance noticed the way that Hunk kept his eyes glued on Keith for the entire meal, as if goading him to say something and make him mad. Lance didn’t understand it, Hunk wasn’t the type to be angry at… Well anyone? Even those who had wronged him. But the way he was glaring at Keith now, the way he’d spoken to him yesterday before Keith and Lance headed for their mission. It didn’t sit well in Lance’s stomach.

He couldn’t ponder over it for too long though as not long after, the entire group began to finish up their meals and sit back in their chairs, happy with full bellies.

“You’ve done it again, Hunk, my bro, that was yum.” Lance giggled as he let out a not so lady-like belch. 

“You’re welcome. I used one of those spices you collected yesterday.” Hunk turned and smiled back at Lance. “You did a good job on that Lance, even if you were too lazy to put it all away.”

“Ha.” Lance reached up and scratched at the back of his neck. “It was no trouble. Keith and I enjoyed it… Well most of it. We were glad to bring some stuff back for you.”

Hunk nodded his head before turning back again to an almost shy looking Keith and grimacing at him.

Okay. This was just getting weirder now. What had Keith done?

“Well. I’ll have to agree with Lance.” Shiro nodded his head as he raised to his feet. “That was extremely delicious, Hunk, thank you. You all have your duties free for the morning so you may do as you wish until Lunch while I go and speak with Allura about future plans, then we can know what-”

“Shiro! Wait, can you listen to me now?!” Pidge pouted, pushing herself onto her feet with her hands slammed down on to the table.

Shiro immediately regarded her before sighing. “Fine.” 

He slowly sat back down in his seat as Pidge climbed round the table to stand beside him. “Head down to Green’s hangar and I will join you shortly.”

She smiled and nodded her head before immediately taking off out of the room, leaving her half eaten breakfast behind her.

“I suppose I’ll do the dishes then.” Hunk rolled his eyes as he began stacking Lance’s plate on top of his own. “Since no one else offered.”

Keith immediately perked up. “I’d be happy to help you, Hunk, I’ve barely-”

“No need. I can manage.” Hunk immediately shot back before swiftly collecting the rest of the dishes and leaving the room without another word.

“Well…” Keith coughed awkwardly. “I suppose I’ll go train then, if there’s nothing for me to do elsewhere.”

“Lance, go with him.” Shiro suddenly spoke up.

Lance gawped, it took him a second to click that Shiro had been speaking to him but he was the only one left in the room so he couldn’t have been speaking to someone else. “Shiro, I  _ already _ trained this morning, got up nice and early, trained, came back to shower and get back into my favourite pyjamas. I’m so beat right now, but I will train some more later.”

“Lance.” Suddenly Lance was hit with  _ the look _ and felt himself shrink in his boots. “I know you've been tricking the training room to clock more hours in. Do as I say now and I won't start escorting you to your training myself in future.”

Lance nodded swiftly. “Why of course, Shiro, happy to oblige.”

Keith snorted from behind and Lance flashed him a nice brandishing of his middle finger, still eye to eye with Shiro for another moment or two before turning to follow. 

The two left the lounge and headed towards the training area together. For a while they were quiet, but possibly without thinking, Keith let out a tired and even sad sounding sigh.

“You good?”

“Yeah.”

“You lying?”

“... No.”

“Is it what Hunk said?”

Keith remained silent, the only answer Lance really needed.

“Keith… what's going on between you and Hunk?” Lance gulped, he knew he'd have to approach the topic carefully since even from body language Lance could see Keith wasn't up for talking about it.

“Hunk hasn't told you?” Keith shuffled uncomfortably, just as the two reached the door to the training room and entered. 

“No.”

“I was hoping you would tell me, Lance.” He whispered now. 

Lance turned to face Keith completely, but the shorter boy looked tired and stressed, his forehead creasing as if in deep thought.

“I don't know what to do, Lance.” Keith suddenly whimpered and his tone almost broke Lance's heart in two.

“He's been acting strange with me since I came back from the blades and I don't know why. It's like everyone is. Allura isn't as… friendly either. Everytime she talks to me it's like when your boss is keeping tabs on you. Pidge is primarily the same but… she just seems less open, doesn’t talk one-to-one with me anymore.”

“Oh?” Lance's eyes widened in surprise. He hadn't noticed the change himself but in all honesty but to be fair, he had only woken up yesterday morning. 

“I understand if they're mad at me for leaving but… They're my family. I want to make it up to them, I want them to know that I'm still me.”

“I'm sure they do know that, Keith.”

“I don't know.”

Without thinking, Lance stepped forward and pulled Keith against him. Wrapping his arms tight around the young blade. He felt Keith tense but he didn't pull away.

“We're a family, Keith. We stick together. I don't know what their reasons are, maybe they just missed you and are scared to get to close to you because… you will leave again and it hurts them but they love you.”

Keith didn't say anything else. Just stood there for a few minutes, Lance didn't think about their past or the awkward position they were in given their history. All he was thinking about was his friend and how his friend needed comfort right now and god damn would Lance give that to him.

Slowly, Keith pulled away and made his way deeper into the room before summoning his bayard. 

“Come on then Sharpshooter.” Keith smirked, changing the subject completely. Understandably. “I hope you’ve improved since I last saw you.”

Lance smirked as he pulled off his robe and kicked off his slippers, leaving him in just his joggers and a bare chest. Which, yes, he caught Keith staring at for just a second before looking away.

He pulled his bayard from the joggers and brandished it towards Keith. “Pretty hard to beat perfection, baby, but I’m sure I have.”

“Bring it, McClain.”

The two of them crashed into each other in the middle, to begin with they tested their close combat, Lance using his rifle as a shield from Keith’s attacks. Lance knew that close combat was where Keith really shone so he tried not to let his ego get too bruised each time Keith managed to take him down.

They battled like that for a while, sometimes Lance was able to get a good attack in and trip Keith over but it was Lance who spent most of the time on his back or on his ass with some new bruises to replace the ones that faded since his last fight. 

“You’re improved.” Keith nodded before tripping Lance over once again. “You’re not completely awful anymore. You actually pack some weight behind your punches now.”

“I’m a growing boy, Keith.” Lance snarked back, wiping at the sweat at his head. “I’ve got a way to go yet.”

Keith chuckled before the two met again, tackling each other, both weapons discarded by now and resorting to more childish methods and biting and pulling each other’s hair. Not really helpful when you’re going against the Galra but Lance was enjoying himself, and it seemed Keith was as well by the wide smile across his cheeks.

Eventually they changed over, letting Lance really show off his sharpshooter nature. They didn’t stick at it long because obviously Lance didn’t have much room for improvement in that area, and although Keith tried, he wasn’t as accurate as Lance. 

Lance is well aware that he is a very sore winner and Keith is one, hot-headed, bad tempered man who can probably only take so much of Lance’s gloating. 

They’d been training for a while though, about three hours after they entered. Keith grabbed his bayard from the side of the room and retracted it back to his waist. 

“I think that’s enough for now.” Keith smiled. “I wanna go for a shower.”

“Is your pride fully destroyed from having to tussle with a McClain?” Lance teased but he was already reaching for his robe and tying it around himself again, as well as getting his beautiful, god’s-gift slippers back onto his feet.

“Yes. My ego is broken. I don’t know how I’m going to continue living.” Keith replied back deadpan before smirking. “Do you mind if I go fly Red around for a while? I wanted to just go fly for a bit before Lunch?”

Lance nodded. “Fine by me.”

“Great.” 

The two headed to the doors together before parting ways.

“Later, Rango.” Lance saluted as Keith began heading towards the showers. “Look after my Lion would you? Not a scratch or I’m taking it out of your paycheck.”

“Take it up with my ass, Cargo pilot.”

Lance gasped dramatically but chuckled a second after as he headed to the right and decided immediately to go see the man of his dreams, the love of his life, the salt to his pepper.

Hunk.

He didn’t even pause to talk to the two alteans he passed in the hallway, just gave them both a quick wave as he picked up the pace and basically ran towards the kitchen doors where he’d hoped Hunk would be. Sure enough, Lance entered the kitchen and was pleased to find Hunk, hard at work with several bowls all over his workstation, the ovens heated to full blast and a pleasant aroma immediately filling Lance’s senses. 

“Hello Husbando.” Lance preened as Hunk turned to him with a smile. “What’s cooking, good looking?”

“Just experimenting today. I wanted to try out some of the other things you brought back.” Hunk nodded. “There was this really cool powder in a jar. It had like a red bow around it.”

“Oh yeah, that was a gift from one of their farmer like locals.” Lance nodded. “Anything with a bow on it was a gift.”

“Well it was very nice of them.” Hunk chuckled. “It smelt kind of like cocoa powder so I’m trying to make a few things. Brownies, sponge cake, chocolate biscuits and then later I thought I’d try and make some hot chocolate.”

“If you crack them then I will make sure we never leave this pocket of the universe again so we can keep getting powder from that planet.” Lance grinned. “I’m a total slut for a choco biscuit.”

Hunk smirked again and got back to work, grabbing at different bowls and pouring in different ingredients into each one. Lance never understood Hunk’s method when he cooked, only that he was an excellent multi tasker who could make hundreds of different things all at once and never lose his train of thought.

“So how’s your day been?” Hunk smirked. “Lunch isn’t for another hour.”

“Keith wanted to take a shower and then go fly Red for a bit so we parted ways and I thought I’d come see my life partner.” Lance shrugged, watching Hunk’s hands at work as they speedily whisked different bowls. 

“Fly Red? You sure you’re okay with that?”

“Of course.” Lance chuckled. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I dunno. I just don’t think I’d be completely comfortable with some guy flying Yellow around.”

“He’s not just some guy, he’s Keith.” Lance frowned back as Hunk tried to avoid his gaze.

“Same thing.”

Lance walked behind him then, forcing Hunk to turn away from his station to follow him as Lance leant against one of the fridges to block Hunk from getting into it.

“Hunk. Why are you mad at Keith?”

“I'm not.” Hunk huffed, immediately giving himself away as he turned back to his work station and began heavily mixing one of the bowls.

Lance looked around the kitchen dramatically. “Hang on a moment, is something burning? Or is that just your pants on fire?”

Hunk didn’t look up but Lance caught the snort that left him.

“Don't lie to Lance, Hunky. What's going on?” Lance walked over to his Hunk’s right side to stand beside him as he continued to work but Hunk continued to avoid his gaze. “Hunk.”

“It’s nothing, I just-”

“ _ Hunk…”  _ Lance whined over him, childishly and irritating on purpose, he just wanted his best friend to be honest with him so that Lance could figure out a way to sort this, he didn’t want to see Keith upset about this, and he didn’t like seeing Hunk mad either, it seemed unnatural. 

“He hurt you Lance.” Hunk suddenly threw his hands up in exasperation, some of the mixture escaping and splashing the pair of them. 

“Keith? When did he-”

“He wasn't nice about… Anything! He didn't let you down easy. He made it all out like you were the one in the wrong and he hurt you. I'm just trying to stick up for you.” 

Lance blinked in surprise, he definitely hadn't expected Hunk to say that.

Hunk sighed, wiping at some stray mixture on his face before tasting it and grimacing at it. “Yeah, so he gets a little Hunk-Rage for a couple weeks. A bro has to do it for his bro.”

“Well… Hunk…”

“Lance.” Hunk mumbled back, turning away from Lance’s eyes that he knew were piercing into him like blunt knives, pretending like there was something interesting going on to his left.

“Hunk, you- I don't w-want you to do that anymore… Please. Yeah I wish things could be different between Keith and I, but I'm learning to deal with it,” Lance pushed himself against Hunk’s back, wrapping his arms around him, only to hide his own sad expression. “-and seeing him upset because he feels like he's lost his family hurts more than the fact I'm not with him.”

“Lance-”

“I don't want him to be alone just because I'm a little hurt. That's not fair to him.”

The two stood there in silence for a second, before Hunk turned around and hugged Lance properly, sticking his face in Lance’s neck and squeezing him so tight that it was almost uncomfortable. Almost. A hug from Hunk would always be a blessing from the gods, no matter how hard.

“Keith's my brother, Lance. He always will be. Siblings fight sometimes when the other has done something stupid.” Hunk mumbled back as he pulled his head out to look at Lance. “But… I'll cut the punishment back if it's affecting him like that.”

“Thank you.”

“I'll kick his ass in a few months when this is all behind us and not even relevant anymore. Take him by surprise.” Hunk chuckled, reaching up to wipe some of the mixture from Lance’s face and instead wiping it on his nose.

Lance snorted. “Okay deal.”

The conversation ended there thankfully and pretty much everything returned back to normal. At lunch, Keith had returned from his time with Red and settled down with the rest of them to be completely surprised when Hunk had returned to his normal self. Joking and messing with him at the table and just returned back to how he had been.

Keith had looked down the table to Lance, as if demanding to know what he’d done, but Lance just shrugged his shoulders and joined in with the teasing.

Life on the castle continued much similarly to that. Everything was how it used to be, back even before Shiro had disappeared. It reminded Lance of their first days on the Castleship, only now they were a lot more comfortable with one another, but the atmosphere was soft and kind and friendly. Exactly what Lance had wanted from his family.

A couple of weeks passed after that, and Lance was absolutely willing to admit that the weeks felt like pure bliss. Having Keith back with the team seemed just to make everything better, like they were no longer missing a part of themselves.

Co-piloting had been a bit of a struggle at the beginning, mostly because both of them wanted to be driving at all times but eventually they worked out a system. Feeling more comfortable with his bond with Red, Lance felt more at ease giving up control of his lion for Keith to enjoy himself, it was hard to deny him everytime Lance saw the smile on his face as he piloted again.

Everything was great, they went on a few missions. Lance still being forced to have Keith accompany him but he wasn’t going to complain just yet, he liked the company even if it was only because Shiro didn’t trust him out on his own anymore. Fair enough, he supposed, the last two big missions Lance had gone on had been… Successful but almost disastrous, let’s put it that way.

But Lance wasn’t sent out very often, Allura pretty much insisted that Lance really stay on the castleship and rest up. That his injury on the quintessence mission had been caused by Lance’s lack of downtime between missions. He had tried to disagree but it was pretty much pointless. Plus Allura was offering him some time off, and some things to do to pass the time, like finally showing him how to get into the pool, letting him play the game him and Pidge had bought and she’d hooked up, letting him watch altean movies, fly Red, train. 

It was all quite… Boring.

How had it come to pass that doing nothing was now Lance’s least favourite thing to do? Back on Earth he’d longed for just a minute of peace, just to sit and do something he enjoyed, then when he joined a war, that longing had almost doubled. But, now that he had actually had it, he didn’t want it at all.

Sure, there were some positives. Since Lance was on mission ban, that pretty much meant Keith was as well since Shiro seemed so damn insistent that the two of them remained together at all times. Which was what they were doing. Keith and Lance spent the majority of their time together now. Mostly when they were training since Keith was a bit of a gym junkie, but they chilled together too. They’d go to the longue together and talk about things on Earth they enjoyed, Lance hadn’t been even a little bit surprised that Keith was a big fan of Buzzfeed unsolved and that it was one of the only things he missed about Earth. 

“Their mothman episode changed my life.”

“You’re a nerd.” Lance had chuckled back, but he’d watched the show, and he’d secretly enjoyed that episode as well.

Everything continued much like that, it was a pleasant time on the castle for the first time in what had felt like a very long time and it could only get better.

As was proved when Allura fluttered in to dinner one day.  Allura entered the room with the same amount of poise and beauty that she always showed and sat down at the head of the table, a welcoming smile on her face.

“Who tickled your pickle?” Lance frowned at her, not liking how happy she actually seemed. Usually that meant some sort of surprise drill or team exercise. ‘Good for Voltron’ has she called them.

“I have an announcement.” She declared, looking to each of her paladins in turn. “There is to be a ball tonight on Slokapitar in our honour.”

The room immediately filled with a mixture of groans and cheers.

Allura continued nevertheless. “The Sloka people have planned a massive banquet and dance where we can all introduce ourselves to the council, as well as the locals.”

“No way!” Hunk gawped. “They’re going to cook for us.”

Allura sent him a polite smile. “I’ve already spoken to the Prince and he is sending a few of their chefs up to join in the festivities. I thought you’d appreciate talking with them, Hunk.”

Hunk pounded his fist excitedly into the air.

“Dancing though, Hunk.” Pidge sneered. “I couldn’t think of anything worse.”

“I love dancing!” Lance gasped at her to which she just shrugged her shoulders like she already knew. Well, to be fair, it was common knowledge that Lance had a particularly dirty slut drop when asked to perform.

“Slut drops are not dancing.” Keith spoke up as if he’d read Lance’s mind. “Anyone can do that, doesn’t make them a dancer.”

“You’re not a dancer and I would love to see you drop it like it’s hot, Kogane.” Lance snorted back, poking his tongue out. “I couldn’t think of anything funnier to watch.”

Keith blushed. “I don’t want to drop, doesn’t mean I can’t do it.”

“Yes it does. You won’t because you can’t.” Lance goaded.

“I can!”

“Can’t.”

“Listen here, McClain, I’ll show you who ca-”

“Quiet.” Shiro raised his hand like an irritated teacher calling the class to attention again. “The Princess had yet to finish what she was saying.”

Lance poked his tongue out once more at Keith, making sure to send him a dirty wink afterwards before returning his attention to Allura who seemed to be smiling at him.

“Yes.” She smiled. “Well the ball is this evening so I’ve decided to put my own, Hunk’s and Pidge’s solo missions on hold for a few days since they can be rescheduled so that we can all focus on this ball tonight. So yes, you guys have this afternoon to do as you please and be ready around dinner time so that we can travel down to the planet surface.”

Hunk spooned Allura a spoonful of the dish he’d made, some sort of spaghetti knock-off Lance wasn’t sure, it looked like spaghetti but tasted like fish, he didn’t wanna talk about it. 

“Lance. I’d like you to red this evening.” Allura smiled. “Keith you’ll be wearing black.”

“Umm, pardon me, Allura.” Lance raised his hand. “Hate to interrupt you know I do, but I always wear blue.”

“I’ve always allowed you to wear blue.” Allura corrected. “I’ve noticed your bond with the Red lion increasing in strength this last month, Lance, and it is time now that you start dressing with your lion.”

Lance immediately started to whine. “But,  _ Allura,  _ I don’t look good in red.”

“You look lovely in red.” Hunk spoke up. “Remember back when we first started the garrison at the welcome party, that red jacket you wore. You looked like a magician.”

“This is a ball, Hunk.” Lance whimpered. “Not a dress up party... And that is not a compliment!”

“Put a mask on and you can go as Dash from The Incredibles.” Shiro chuckled heartily from the other end.

“If you don’t rub your cream into your chin properly like you did the other day, add the suit, you can go as Father Christmas.” Pidge snorted.

Now Keith was laughing. “Wear a purple belt, you could go as Baymax.” 

“Oh my gods, you are all so mean, I hate this family.”


	11. Chapter Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm not very happy with this chapter so Chapter 12 may not be out for a while as I want to make sure I've got this chapter as best as I can get. But I thought I'd post it now just to save it from sitting on my computer

A few hours passed, Lance and Hunk were sat in the lounge room, dressed to impress as they waited for the arrival of their fellow paladins. After a few minutes of waiting the doors whooshed open and one shorty entered. 

“Well aren’t you looking rather dapper.” Lance couldn’t stop himself from teasing as the green paladin finally made her way in. 

“Wow. One of the first to be ready for a party?” Pidge grumbled in reply, as she slumped across the room and sat beside an also very dapper looking Hunk on the sofa, the two looked quite matching in their yellow and green suits. “I’m surprised. Did you decide to not pluck your pubes today?” 

“I do not pluck my pubes!” Lance gasped but his words fell on deaf ears as at the same time he had spoken, Hunk had leaned over to Pidge and informed her that he had told Lance to be ready for 6 when 7 was the actual meeting time.

“That makes sense. Good idea too since I’m guessing you only got here a little while ago.” Pidge chuckled into their hand.

“Betrayal, Hunk. I hope you don’t treat me like this in front of the kids.” Lance mumbled, smoothing down his outfit for what felt like the one hundredth time. He just couldn’t help himself, it wasn’t often that the paladins attended lush parties, and it was even rarer that they didn’t have to wear their paladin armour in attendance. They could actually wear fancy suits that complimented them far better than chunky metal did. Well… Usually… Tonight Lance was wearing something that didn’t suit him at all.

“I don’t like this colour.” Lance mumbled out loud.

“It’s time to accept it, Lance.” Pidge smirked, reading his mind instantly. “You’re the red paladin now, and you have to colour coordinate with your current lion. Not your previous one.”

“But blue goes with my eyes… Plus I have never found a blue suit that doesn’t make my arse look like an astronaut.”

“Astron-”

“Out of this world.” Lance winked at the pair.

Pidge dropped her head into her hands in disappointment. “Did you just use a pick up line on your own butt?”

“Well… No one else has been doing it recently. My butt feels left out.” Lance pouted. “Especially since the poor thing has been draped in red, a colour that would look nicer on a corpse than on me.”

“You are so dramatic.” Hunk chuckled but gently stood up and made his way over to Lance, using his own hands to dust at Lance’s pristine two piece suit that in no way needed dusting but Hunk had probably caught on how Lance had been doing it anyway. “You look amazing. Total hottie. If I had to pick a dude, you’d be like third on the list.”

“3rd?” Lance laughed back. “Who the hell beat me?”

“Well… Shiro-.”

“Damn, you right-”

“And Chadwick Boseman.”

“Okay. That’s right. 3rd is good. I’m not even mad about it.” Lance smirked, immediately pushing into Hunk’s space and wrapping his arms around him. “You look good too man, if I had to pick a dude, you’d be first.”

Immediately, as if que, the door hissed open once more but this time three sets of footprints made their way into the room. Lance released himself from Hunk’s hold and turned to the new members of the party, but before he could decipher everyone who had arrived he immediately clocked onto Allura and had to stop himself from dropping to his damn knees and praying. 

Allura, being the only one who had chosen to wear a dress, stood tallest of everyone. She wore a tight fitted bodice accompanied by a princess skirt which was the same shade of Blue that coated her lions armour. Her outfit reminded Lance of Cinderella, but this was no princess stood in front of him, this was a damn queen.

“Allura.” Lance gawped. “Excuse my French but holy shit.”

Allura blinked in surprise but her expression changed to affectionate as she crossed the room and enveloped Lance in a tight embrace. “I’m glad you’ve finally taken up my advice and worn the red. It suits you, I’ve never seen you look so dashing.”

“What are you talking about?” Lance tried to hide the blush spreading across his cheeks with faux confidence. “I’m dashing on the daily.”

Allura rolled her eyes and signalled Pidge over to her quickly to compliment Pidge’s lovely emerald green suit that she was wearing. As they passed sweet notes to each other, Lance let his eyes roam to the other two new faces into the room, and once again he was starstruck, his jaw almost falling to the floor as he leaning against his Yellow paladin for support.

“You guys look like someone from one of the best bond films.” Hunk nodded his head. “Thank you 007 for your services. Pip-pip, cheerio.”

Lance wanted to make a comment about Hunk’s terrible British accent but he couldn’t tear his eyes away from the two black suit wearing gods in the room. Particularly the shorter one on the right if Lance was completely honest with himself.

Shiro looked good, sure, of course he did, he was Shiro after all. But… Then there was the god of seduction himself, or should Lance say the god of se- _ Suction _ . Yes, very good joke Lance, Keith is good at giving head, what a brilliant line. He should write that one down.

Keith looked unbelievably uncomfortable but he had no reason to be, with his hair in a tight ponytail and his tight fitted black suit pressed against him, he looked like something from Lance’s wildest fantasy. The suit was gorgeous, but Lance knew it would look even better on his bedroom floor, the person inside spread across his sheets like an open book, panting and sweaty and-

“Lance stop staring, you’re making Shiro uncomfortable.” Hunk awkwardly chuckled as he elbowed Lance suddenly in the ribs, ripping him from his fantasy. 

“Oh.” Lance blushed, he hadn’t been staring at Shiro but whatever, Hunk was probably just saving his ass, but let the masses think what they want. Keith would still look hot. “Sorry, I was just surprised.”

“Yes, y'all clean up real well. Can we go now?” The Devil himself was the next to speak up, kicking at nothing at his feet, he reached up and pulled his ponytail tightly before shyly looking across the room. Maybe it was Lance’s imagination but it seemed like Keith was trying to look anywhere but at him.

“Ooh.” Pidge suddenly sang, walking up to Lance’s right side. “Keith seems in a rush. What is it buddy? You excited to go get your cowboy square dancing feet on the dance floor.”

Keith turned away from the group immediately but Lance caught the way his face turned red at her words. “I will physically fight you, small child.”

“Speaking of small childs- Children.” Shiro corrected himself. “Pidge your task is to dance with all the children who want to dance tonight as the rest of us will be discussing politics with the government officials.”

“I refuse.” Pidge rolled her eyes, walking on ahead and stepping past him. “Sorry boss, I don’t dance.”

“I’ll do it.” Lance shrugged his shoulders. “Dancing with the kids sounds fun.”

“Sorry, Lance. We need your dancing feet for the adults.” Allura smirked. “Shiro and I can talk the talk, but it is you that will have to walk the walk as it were.”

Hunk snorted. “Well… I guess that means Keith is on babysitting duty.”

“Good idea, Hunk.” Shiro smiled, immediately cutting off Keith as he was about to argue. “While you, Hunk, will stand by the food dishes and make nice with the locals, since cooking is your speciality that seems like a smart place to have you stationed.”

“Space dad, please remember this is a party, not a battle.” Lance smirked. “Don’t forget to bring your fun gloves and let loose a little bit.”

“Yes, Lance is right.” Allura nodded. “It is healthy for us paladins to unwind every now and again to recover our strengths. Don’t forget that, Shiro.”

“So…” Pidge frowned. “Are we going? Now?”

As if summoned on cue, the doors opened again and Coran stepped through, dressed in what could only be described as a magician’s outfit and a huge smile across his cheeks.

“Are we ready crew? The Sloka people are expecting us in exactly 20 dobashes. They’ve sent us one of their pods to escort us down and might I say… It is very snazzy. Come, come, let’s go.”

The youngest paladins immediately followed at top speed, Lance and Pidge racing each to see who could see the ship first with Hunk just a few steps behind them, not even really caring about the race just excited to see the ship same as Lance and Pidge were. 

Once they rounded the final corner, the three of them couldn’t say a damn thing. This wasn’t like any pod they had on the Castle, the pod was huge, almost the size of Red herself, with a black painting and gold linings, long and stylish with blacked out windows. It reminded Lance more of a limo than a ship.

They were too in shock even to notice the Sloka General who had stepped forward to greet them.

“Paladins of Red and Yellow and Green. It is an honour to meet you.” A soft, sweet voice spoke. The general was quite tall, a foot or so above Lance’s height with 6 limbs, 2 arms and 4 legs that held them up tall. “My name is Saffri.”

It was Pidge who’d stepped forward then, her trance with the ship cut short, a deep blush on her cheeks. “Hi. My name is Pidge.”

“I’m Hunk.” Hunk immediately saluted after, stepping forward and pulling Lance with him. “And this is Lance. It’s a pleasure to meet you as well.”

The rest of the group soon caught up and also made their greetings to the general before they were shown into the pod. The ride down was smooth and thankfully short, before long the ship was landing and all 7 members of Team Voltron climbed out the back of the ship and were shown the way into and through the large castle.

“This castle has stood untouched for thousands of years.” Saffri explained as she led them down corridor after winding corridor. “The Sloka population was once split into two halves, the Slogians and the Kateds who, according to legend, had been at war since the birth of our white star Saffrian Wharf who coincidently, or not I suppose, I am named after. The Slogians and the Kateds were two different breeds of species, the Slogians who inhabited the surface and the Kateds who inhabited the undergrounds. However, generations ago the Kated population began to filter onto the surface, causing a war that spanned for hundreds of years. That is until our forefathers brokered an alliance that brought the two civilisations together into a new era of peace.”

Lance stared at Saffri absolutely mesmerized as they walked, Lance had always been a fan of history back on Earth, even if academically his grades didn’t show it, but when you’re out in space learning a whole new type of history, Lance couldn’t stop himself from being enthralled.

“If you look around our society today, you’d have absolutely no idea that we were once from two species.” Saffri continued. “Through evolution, and a blending of the two species we now possess the evolutionary advantages of both, heat resistance from our surface dwelling ancestors and cold resistance from our underground dwelling ancestors, allowing the Sloka people to live harmoniously through all weather conditions our planet can seek to put us through. We have lived through a planet’s life time of war, and we continue to thrive for thousands of years after our planet’s death.”

“Wow.” Lance turned to see Keith, who had been walking beside him through the castle, looking towards Saffri slightly stunned. 

“Close your mouth, Keith.” Lance elbowed Keith, whispering softly so the other’s couldn’t hear. “It’s not a boys sleepover.”

Keith expression of awe was immediately replaced with revulsion as he turned and elbowed Lance twice as hard into the stomach, completely winding him. 

Lance doubled over, torn between coughing and laughing. The group, entirely used to the boys antics after however many months they’ve been in space now, completely ignored the tussle and continued walking before suddenly the group were breaking through into the main hall.

Where the party had already started, falling silent as Team Voltron entered.

“My I present, the honourable Paladins of Voltron.” Saffri stepped forward and addressed the crowd, signalling for the paladins to step forward. Since Keith didn’t move, Lance stayed beside him as the others (excluding Coran) stepped forward and waved bashfully to the crowd. That is until Keith suddenly pushed him forward till he was a few steps ahead so that Lance could wave himself.

Lance waved for a second before grabbing Keith by the shoulder and retching him forward too, actually reaching and lifting Keith’s hand up to wave.

“Lance.” Keith hissed under his breath.

“If I’m waving, then you’re waving too, paladin.” Lance snapped back just as quiet, his voice held a sense of finality and authority that not even Keith could argue with him. 

So he didn’t. The six stood in a line waving as a crowd of individuals swarmed up to them, and without even another words to each other, were all dragged away in different directions. 

Lance fluttered round from group to group, coincidently all the Sloka people spoke perfect American English which made absolutely no freaking sense in a universe this big and a country like America so small, on one small planet in the Milky Way that hadn’t even properly explored the stars yet. But whatever, Lance wasn’t going to question it, not when the locals were telling him how pretty he looked.

Lance didn’t mind, he quickly corrected himself into exactly what the paladins wanted to see. The Red Paladin of Voltron, he was cocky and suave, he spoke like a man who knew what they were doing being in a war this big. He bigged up his teammates, their skills, spoke of past planets they’d visited and saved from the evil clutches of Zarkon and the Galran influence. He also spoke fondly of the Blade of Marmora and the rebels, bigging up their involvement in Voltron victories. Explaining that sometimes, it isn’t even Voltron that saves the day, Voltron is just the Avatar Aang of the story, whereas the blades, the rebels and everyone else involved in this side of the war were the friends he had made along the way.

That metaphor hadn’t gone down as smoothly as he’d hoped. So, they can speak the language but they don’t understand the culture, guess that’s where Lance’s coincidental pot of luck ran out.

Soon enough, Lance fluttered round until he reached Shiro, deep in conversation with one individual who looked… Well, a lot fancier than the others.

As he approached, both individuals turned to him with smiles on their faces.

“Lance.” Shiro was talking in his “boss” voice. “Are you enjoying yourself? This is Prince Lizo of the Sloka people, he’s been talking to me about the history of this castle.”

“Very nice.” Lance winked, bowing courteously at the Prince in greeting. “I imagine a castle like this is quite quiet, so many rooms that noise just gets lost.”

“You’d be right in assuming so, Red Paladin.” The Prince smiled. “The castle is haunted by many ghosts of our past and yet the halls are ever silent. Perhaps later I can show you. But for now, I must remain here and relish in the happiness of my people.”

The group turned to the dance floor where dozens of Slokans were dancing around in circles, similar to the Earth waltz if Lance was honest, the timing was the same as well. 

“Do you dance, Prince Lizo?” Lance smiled turning back to the Prince.

“I was trained in the performance of multiple cultural dances of my people from a very young age. But if you are asking if I partake in any of these performances at the setting of grand balls, I’m afraid the answer is sadly not.”

“How come?” Lance gawped. “Nothing is better than dancing.”

“Lance.” Shiro held a hand to stop him. “I’m sure the Prince had a thousand and one responsibilities at a ball like this, he most likely does not have the time to-”

“Oh it’s not that at all.” The Prince laughed goodnaturely. “No, I would love to dance at one of my events, but sadly, I have never found a suitable partner.”

“Partner?” Lance frowned. “They all look like beautiful dancers to me. Is it a social standing thing?”

“Somewhat.” The Prince explained. “For generations, royalty have not engaged in the common dance of the Shikra performed by our common society. The royals, by tradition, are only to dance what is called the Shraknion. It is almost like a fight, if you will, where two opposing forces will perform independently from one another in attempt to identify a clear winner who will be chosen from the surrounding crowd. Normally, it is custom for the challenger to allow royalty to win by default, but I do not believe in that. If I am to win the Shraknion, I wish it to be because of my dancing prowess, not because of my status.”

“You know what that sounds like?” Lance winked, pushing himself into the Prince’s personal space.

“What?” Both the Prince and Shiro spoke as one.

“It’s a dance battle!” Lance gasped. “We have those on Earth.”

Shiro immediately looked worried, how could he look worried? Lance was finding common ground with royalty, he should be proud. “They aren’t that common, Lance.”

“Maybe for you, Grandpa.” Lance snorted before tugging at the collar of his shirt. “I, myself, have been in numerous dance competitions both formal and informal and let me tell you, I’ve been titled quite the Michael Jackson on these feet.”

“You are a dancer?” The Prince asked incredulously. “But you are so small and skinny.”

Lance gawped, a little offended but trying not to let it show. “I’ll have you know that my  _ stature _ has actually benefited my dance skills amazingly. Okay, they don’t call you King of the Slut Drops unless you have an ass like mine.”

“Lance!” Shiro gasped in shock, turning to the Prince immediately to probably apologise for Lance’s behaviour, but the Prince just twisted his head in confusion, like a puppy. 

“Now, what exactly is a… slut drop?” The prince asked.

Lance has done a lot of unbelievable things in his life. Teaching royalty how to slut drop was not one of them. After a little bit of teaching and practicing, Lance bid both Shiro and the Prince a goodbye for now with the promise that Lance would happily return later and engage with the Prince in this dance of Shraknion before heading off to find others.

It didn’t take long to find Hunk since Allura had already told Hunk to remain at the food tables, plus Lance was getting kinda hungry too so it served his best needs going to see his best friend and grab some food while he was there.

When he approached, he was met by the biggest, widest smile he could ever have even wanted as Hunk lit up at the sight of him. Lance couldn’t help but immediately light up back at him.

“How are you feeling?” Hunk smirked, his hands full of what looked like custard tarts but the tart base seemed almost a little too dark to be a regular tart.

“Hunky!” Lance whined, plucking one of the tarts and eating it himself. “I’m having so much fun! I never want to leave!”

“I saw you with the Prince earlier.” Hunk laughed. “You seemed to be laughing a lot.”

“I was teaching him about the beauty that is a perfect slut drop.” Lance snorted at the memory from earlier. “I’ve agreed to do multiple slut drops with him later this evening. He seemed very excited.  _ I’m _ very excited.”

“Not everyday you can say you slut dropped with the Prince of an entire planet.” Hunk laughed harder. “Enjoy it while you can.”

“Oh I plan to.”

“Also, I noticed him earlier, isn’t that your friend from the blades over there?” Hunk frowned as he picked up another tart looking thing and pressed it into his mouth, chewing with his mouth open as he pointed behind Lance’s back. “Okay, I know you said he was tall but wow.”

Lance turned and his eyes immediately lit up as he caught sight of his friend Dacor at one corner of the room, chatting idly with one of the locals.

Lance turned back to Hunk just as the younger boy had finished what he was eating, then he grimaced. “Listen Lance, I’m all for you getting dates and meeting someone and that. But I’m a little worried about you.”

Lance widened his eyes in surprise and immediately looked down at his feet as he thought Hunk was about to tell him off. “I-I’m not dating Dacor.”

“Well… You can date him. But I know you… That guy is so tall I’m scared he would literally break you in half.” Hunk suddenly laughed before leaning and whispering. “I know your sex drive and I worry for your sex safety.”

“Oh my god!” Lance immediately recoiled, face turning beat red. “That’s enough of that conversation. I’m going to go so hello. Please, think about what you just said to me and never say it again.”

“Suddenly shy, Lance?” Hunk snorted in laughter as Lance immediately turned away and speed walked away from his best friends chortling form and straight towards his other friend, hopefully the friend who wouldn’t make him feel completely humiliated.

The room was pretty large so it wasn’t difficult for Lance to make his way through the spread out crowd across the dance floor and straight towards Dacor.

His eyes turned, just drifting really, but when they landed on Lance approaching they suddenly focused and Dacor quickly muttered something to the person beside him before turning to Lance and stepping forward to wrap him in a tight hug.

“Red Paladin.”

“Dacor.” Lance smiled. “What are you doing here?”

Dacor pulled back with a smile before leaning down and picking up Lance’s hand to give a soft kiss in greeting. “Lance. I had heard of your attendance tonight, I was hoping to be able to speak with you. I’ve been sent by Kolivan to attend on behalf of the blades.”

“Oh.” Lance smiled. “Well it is really awesome to see you, man.”

“As it is you.” Dacor purred in return. “Talking across transmitters holds nothing to being able to see you in person.”

Lance blushed, turning away from Dacor’s flirtatious eyes to look at the person Dacor had been speaking to, but was surprised that they had completely turned around to face away from the pair. 

“Would I be able to steal some of your time, Lance?” Dacor suddenly whispered, looking down at his feet as if suddenly shy. “There is something I wish to talk to you about.”

“Oh, of course!” Lance smiled sweetly, leaning down to meet Dacor’s downward gaze.

“It truly is good to see you again, Paladin.” The 7ft tall blade member slowly recovered and smiled down at Lance with genuine kindness in his eyes. 

“Same to you, Dacor.”

Dacor suddenly turned to the alien he’d been speaking with before and continued to speak, though to Lance’s surprise he couldn't understand a word they were saying. That is until Dacor turned back to him and took a hold of Lance’s hand from his side.

“Come. Let’s go outside so we can talk.” Dacor nodded, waving a swift goodbye to whoever he’d been speaking with before.

The two slowly made their way across the floor and outside onto a large balcony, decorating with white flowers and red petals scattered across the floor almost like a cushioned blanket beneath their feet. 

Lance immediately ran over to the edge of the balcony and looked over, the large hall had been situated at the top of the cliff like Lance had thought, water lapped at the bottom of the cliff and Lance could hear the soft waves and gentle splashing from below. Even if it was dark and Lance couldn’t really see anything that clearly, he could close his eyes and imagine Varadero, imagine the beaches and the sun. 

He couldn’t stop his smile as he turned back to Dacor who seemed to freeze at Lance’s expression for just a second before settling again. 

“Shall we dance?” Dacor suddenly asked.

Lance looked up to him in surprise. “But… We’re outside?”

“The music is as lovely here as it is inside. As are you.” Dacor reached for Lance’s hand and suddenly pulled Lance in against his chest, one hand on his lower back, the other holding his hand. Lance reached his arms around Dacor’s neck, or at least as far as he could reach around a 7ft Galra.

“I’m starting to think that when it comes to being a flirt, you may be coming for my crown.” Lance chuckled, allowing Dacor to guide his body to the music. 

“A soldier such as I would be so lucky,” Dacor whispered softly, releasing Lance’s hand before softly rubbing the back of his hand down Lance’s cheek. Lance couldn’t help himself but lean into Dacor’s touch, even though the touch didn’t spark the same warmth in him as others who’d come before. “To be loved by someone such as you.”

“Lucky? Please.” Lance scoffed. “Tell that to the people I’ve dated in the past. They’d probably disagree.”

“Oh but you are. In fact, better. Even someone like me who knows you so little can see into your heart, a beautiful instrument made of gold that keeps an even more beautiful being breathing and living. But, sadly, I am no fool, I can see into your heart, young paladin, and I now know that it belongs to another.”

Lance froze just as Dacor removed his hand from his cheek and instead took hold of Lance’s waist and pulled him closer so that the two could sway softly together to the music that echoed from the main hall onto the balcony. 

“You do not have to afraid, Lance.” Dacor chuckled, rubbing his hands in circles across the small of Lance’s back. “As much as I wish I could fight for your affection, I know that it would be a losing battle.”

“According to who?” Lance gulped. 

“I’ve seen people in love before, my paladin, but your love is so strong that I couldn’t even think to try and break it. However, I pity you, I can see the pain behind those beautiful blue eyes of yours. A soul loved by you should sing it all through space but yours does not. I can see that.”

“Seems you see a lot.” Lance sighed in defeat, finally resting his head on Dacor’s chest just so Dacor wouldn’t be able to see the sadness on his face. 

“I am sorry, Lance.” Dacor whispered, lifting one hand to ruffle Lance’s hair softly. “I am sorry that I cannot be what you want.”

“I-” Lance stutered. “I’m sorry too.”

The two softly swayed to the music, neither dared to speak another word and Lance couldn’t stop the deep sadness from settling inside him. Why couldn’t he have this? Dacor was exactly what Lance needed. Someone kind, someone who wanted him, someone who respected him for who he was and what he did but would still treat Lance like the princess he really was on the inside. 

Minutes rolled by and the two remained in silence, just swaying softly. Dacors hands never leaving Lance’s back and Lance’s head never leaving Dacor’s chest. If Lance listened closely, he was sure he could hear the soft thumps of Dacor’s heart, matching the beat of the music and the sway of their bodies. Lance moved his hands from around Dacor’s shoulders, sliding down his arms to make the position more comfortable. As soon as he did, Dacor’s heartbeat quickened for just a second before returning back to the normal pace. 

“In another reality.” Dacor softly whispered.

“In another reality.” Lance agreed.

The two descended into silence again and for a minute, Lance thought he could fall asleep right here and happily never stop dancing here with Dacor. How cruel was that? To hold on to someone who he knew felt more for him than he did for them.

Perhaps that was why Lance went through the pain he did, that little bit of selfishness that made him not want to let go of Dacor or exit from his warm arms. Perhaps that was why Keith clung to him, that momentary satisfaction, like filling the void that was left from fighting in an endless war. That desperation to be loved but too afraid to love back.

Just as Lance felt his eyes begin to close and his mind begin to daze, a cough signalled from behind the dancing pair.

“Sorry to interrupt.” A voice suddenly broke through the sweet silence. “Lance?”

Lance pulled away from Dacor’s chest and looked towards his old black paladin stood by the balcony doors, staring at the pair in extreme discomfort.

“Keith.” Lance breathed softly as Dacor released his loose grip on Lance’s body so he could step away. “What’s up?”

“Umm…” Keith gulped. “Nothing, I just, I was gon- It doesn’t matter. I interrupted.”

“Nonsense, young blade.” Dacor spoke up and walked Lance over towards him, one hand never leaving the bottom of Lance’s spine. “I should probably speak with the princess anyway, you know, actually get on with my mission. I shall speak with you both later. Keith… Lance.”

Lance couldn’t stop the sad smile as Dacor leaned down and softly pressed his lips to Lance’s cheek before making a swift exit from the balcony. Leaving Keith and Lance completely alone and in silence bar the sound of the slow music playing from inside. 

“Are you okay?” Keith suddenly whispered. 

“I’ll be fine.” Lance whispered back, reaching up to rub at the back of his neck. “What is it you were going to ask?”

“Well, I was going to ask if you wanted to dance for a bit.” Keith gulped. “But… I don’t want you to feel like you have to. I understand if you’d rather be alone.”

Lance couldn’t stop the smile from overtaking his face, and he almost felt sick from just how easy Keith seemed to make everything so much better. “No. I’d love to. Come on.” 

The two made a swift exit from the balcony, Lance trying his best to forget about the conversation he’d just had with Dacor otherwise it was likely that he was going to break down into tears, the worst part being that he wasn’t exactly sure why he was so sad about it. He just knew that he was.

But Keith didn’t seem to mind going at Lance’s pace, slowly leading him into the middle of the dancefloor before twirling Lance until he fell against his chest, using the position to quickly wrap his arms loosely around Lance’s waist, the two slowly moving to the soft gentle music coming from the band. 

Lance slowly began to get comfortable, lifting his arms to drop against Keith’s shoulders and held them behind his head. The comfort he felt was instantaneous. The two were just a few inches apart but after a minute or two more, Keith suddenly pulled him that little bit closer until the two were pressed tight against one another.

“Something wrong?” Lance whispered carefully, he could feel his heart picking up the pace in his chest and he quickly urged it to stop.

“People keep looking at you and the prince keeps looking over like he’s going to come over and interrupt us.” Keith grumbled. “They can’t have a problem with two paladins dancing together, right?”

“Of course not.” Lance couldn’t help but laugh. He reached with the one hand resting on Keith’s shoulder and poked at his cheek at the deep frown Keith had set in. “I’ve already spoken with the prince tonight and promised him a dance. He’s probably just wondering when I’m going to ask him.”

Keith growled all of a sudden and turned the pair around so Lance’s back was to the prince. 

“Let me guess, you don’t trust the prince?” Lance smirked at Keith who immediately tightened his grip to almost bruising around Lance’s waist. 

“It’s my turn to dance with you. I’m sick of dancing with all the 6 legged things. They keep stepping on my feet, that’s a lot of feet stepping.”

“They’re children, Keith.” Lance chuckled. “Don’t call them things. You’re the only one short enough who’s willing to dance with them. Besides, who says I won’t step on your feet.”

To prove his point, Lance stomped his foot hard on the floor just beside where Keith’s foot had laid flat. Keith jumped a little in surprise but matched Lance’s evil smile tenfold. 

“See. If you step on my feet, I can kick your ass. Can’t really do that with the kids unless I want the parents after me.” Keith chuckled happily. 

“Give it a go. I’d love to see the results.”

“Shut up.” Keith chirped back, taking the lead and spinning Lance across the floor again.

“Okay… So when did you get good at dancing, mister two left feet?” Lance chuckled in surprise.

The pair had danced together at balls and parties numerous times before but it had always been Lance, the more competent and confident dancer, who took the lead. It was only now that Lance had realised that Keith was actually leading their dance, and hadn’t made a wrong move yet surprisingly.

“Well, I’ve had a good teacher.” Keith smirked. “Watched him dance thousands of times, I was bound to pick it up eventually.”

Lance couldn’t stop the affectionate smile light up his face. “Wow. He must be pretty good.” 

“He’s a dumbass… But he can dance.” 

“Wow, Keith.”

“Who said I was talking about you?”

“Shut up, Keith.” Lance snorted, pushing at Keith’s shoulder jokingly. Keith stumbled for a second, losing his footing but was quick to recover and didn't even need Lance to guide him. Impressive. Maybe Lance should’ve been paying more attention to what Keith was taking in during their little dance times.

The two danced a while longer, Lance trying to concentrate on the beating of his heart but finding it difficult to not concentrate on the violet of Keith’s eyes staring up at him with a mixture of happiness and mischief. Lance’s favourite aspects of Keith’s personality, so how was he supposed to tear away from them.

But the soft dancing didn’t last long when suddenly Keith was pulling in closer till his lips brushed against Lance’s ear and he growled, deep and animalistic, which sent a deep shiver down Lance’s spine.

“He’s looking at you again.” Keith grumbled.

“Then I suppose I better go, I can’t keep royalty waiting.” Lance smirked, slowly pulling away from Keith’s arms, not a minute too soon because after that growl, Lance was probably going to need 10 minutes alone in the bathroom with no one but his hand for company. “Besides, what kind of party would it be if I wasn’t solely focused on the building of the coalition and securing strong foundation relationships with our allies to the cause in order to take down the universe’s greatest enemy, Emperor Zarkon of the Galra empire.”

“You listen to Shiro too much.”

“I think you mean, Shiro repeats himself too much.”

Keith chuckled so Lance made his way to leave again completely, but suddenly Keith was grabbing at his hand and pulling him in once more.

“We should escape.”

“What?” Lance laughed.

“We should run off, before he can come get you.”

Lance searched Keith’s face for the punchline but he looked deadly serious which made Lance laugh a little under his breath at his friend’s genuine want to leave.

“Keith. That’s mean.” Lance shook his head, mockingly disapproving. “They are our hosts, you don’t run out on kind hosts.”

“You are abandoning me and leaving me at the many hands and feet of terrifying small aliens. Do you know that?”

“Some would consider you a terrifying small alien but do you hear anyone else complaining?” Lance shot back immediately as Keith span the pair around to the music again. 

“Come on, Lance, it’ll be fun.”

“Keith, I can’t jus-”

“I dare you.” Keith suddenly smirked. 

Just like that, all of Lance’s possible arguments were out of the window. He’d been dared. Dared by no one other than Keith, this was out of his hands now, he had no choice. You don’t just say no to a dare, well you don’t if you’re Lance.

“I hate you.” Lance pouted.

“No you don’t.” Keith smirked back arrogantly. “Okay, so on your mark, we make a run for that corridor on your 7 o’clock.”

“Fine.” Lance rolled his eyes, but his pout was immediately replaced with a smile at how fun it was to be with Keith like this. “Ready?”

“Yeah.”

“3. 2.” Pause for dramatic affect. “1”

“Go, go, go!” Keith called out, grabbing Lance’s hand and sprinting from the dance floor and out of the great hall. Lance turned back, a few eyes had turned to watch them go, including a few guards standing by the doors who were confused by the sudden running and made their way after them. They didn’t stop until they rounded several corridors and found an open door that led to a parlour type room. 

Keith pulled the pair of them in closed the door behind them, pushing Lance up against the door with his own body.

“Shush.” Keith pressed a single finger against Lance’s lip as suddenly the sound of quick paced footsteps started down the corridor, rounding past the door and away again until the sounds could no longer be heard. “That was close.”

Lance couldn’t help but laugh. “You just pulled me away from a seemingly really nice guy who had agreed to do slut drops with me on the dance floor. I hope you’re happy.”

“I am.” Keith grunted, his eyes boring into Lance’s.

Almost simultaneously, the pair became aware of the current situation. Panting and out of breath, locked in a room just the two of them, with Keith pressed so tightly against Lance that Lance could suddenly feel Keith’s peaking interest poking him in the upper thigh.

“I am happy, Lance.” Keith whispered, slowly closing the distance between them, so close that their lips brushed before pulling away just slightly again, neither boy made the move to close that small amount of distance. They just stood there, eyes wide open while staring at each other, Lance knew that his eyes would give away just how much he wanted this, but he was surprised by how much Keith’s eyes showed it too.

“Keith.” Lance whispered, not really knowing what else to say, they just stood like that, seconds felt like hours and Lance could feel his heart rate peaking to the highest it had ever been, or at least that’s what it felt like pounding in his chest.

“You smell so good.” Keith whispered, leaning into Lance’s neck and taking a deep breath before pulling back again. “Like summer fruits that have been cooking in a pot to make crumble.”

“Really? I smell like hot fruit?” Lance laughed, leaning his head back onto the door just so he could put some distance between them, plus it got him away from Keith’s lips for just a second so that he could take a moment to breath.

“I love it.”

“You smell good too.” Lance replied, his cheeks blushing a deep red at his words, focusing on his sense of smell and breathing in deep to take in every single smell Keith had to offer.

“What do I smell like?”

“Cinnamon.” Lance blushed. “I love your smell. Rustic and Oaky, it reminds me of the camping trips I use to go on with my family as a kid. Makes me feel… safe.”

Without another word shared between them, Keith lifted one hand to Lance’s neck and before Lance could even think of the consequences, lightly pulled their faces together again until their lips brushed once more. Harder this time. They pulled back for a second again before coming together a third time, pulled back, leaned in, pulled back, both unsure of what to do.

“Keith.” Lance whimpered through the shorter boys rough lips as they spread against his once more. “We can’t.”

“Then make me stop.” Keith pulled back just enough to look up at Lance from under his long eyelashes. “Make me, Lance.”

Lance gulped and although every part of this brain knew that they shouldn’t be doing this, Lance couldn’t stop it. He grabbed at Keith’s head, entangling his hair between Lance’s long fingers and pulled him in a final time, crashing their lips together in a combination of too much teeth and tongue. 

They continued kissing, grinding against each other, desperate for just one touch until Keith pulled away and began to press hard kisses to Lance’s neck and jaw.

“God, seeing you in this suit.” Keith purred happily, rubbing his hands up and down Lance’s shoulders. “I didn’t even want to come here after I saw you, I just wanted to drag you back to my room and keep you there until I had my way with you a dozen times.”

Lance gulped in surprise, he couldn’t even form words as a reply he was so surprised.

“Red suits you so well. You’re like a massive danger sign that I just wanted to pass and see what’s inside. You always looked good in Blue but seeing you now, it’s like my favourite knife after it being sharpened again.”

“T-Trust you,” Lance panted through their lips. “To use a knife m-metaphor.”

“Still trying to start a fight?” Keith chuckled. “That just means I’m not doing my job well enough.”

As if filled with more gusto, Keith immediately captured Lance’s lips again in his, pushing against him, applying just the right amount of pressure until Lance felt like jelly in his arms. 

“Don’t stop.” Lance panted, he wanted Keith to know just how much he enjoyed this, how much he couldn’t get enough of it. Like a drug that he just couldn’t stop taking.

“You’re mine.” Keith growled, running his hands down Lance’s back until they stopped at his thighs, suddenly grabbing him and lifting him to the air, it was nothing Lance wasn’t used to so Lance responded by wrapping his legs around Keith’s waist just as Keith stepped back only to smack Lance against the wall, using the wall to hold most of his weight so that he could spread his fingers down Lance’s waist until they grabbed a tight hold of his arse and squeezed.

Lance let out a soft moan at the touch before tightly wrapping his arms around Keith’s shoulders, stopping him from pulling his lips away again. 

“Let me have you.” Keith continued to whisper through Lance’s lips. “I want to eat you, Lance, let me.”

“Want you now.” Lance immediately agreed. “Please.”

A little voice in the back of his was telling Lance to push him away, to make this end, but the way Keith was kissing him was too good to end. The way he was rough, his hands gripping the back of Lance’s thigh was a deadly grip that would surely bruise but the way his lips were so soft and light, occasionally pulling away to pepper featherlight kisses across Lance’s cheeks and down his neck.

“I’d go to my knees for you, Lance.” Keith growled possessively, turning his soft kisses into rough nibbles and bites that caused Lance to have to take heavy breaths in order to remind himself to keep breathing. “Take you in my mouth and make you feel better than anyone else in this universe.”

“Keith…”

“I just want to wreck you, ruin you for anyone else.”

“Keith, please.” Lance was starting to get anxious, the part of him telling him to pull away tripling in size with every word that Keith spoke.

“You’re mine. No one else can have you.”

“Keith.” Lance growled back, he tried to push back on Keith’s chest but it was rather difficult to do when he was climbing the boy like a monkey on a tree. “Don’t say that.”

“It’s true.” Keith’s bites got rougher again as he tried to keep Lance from escaping. “You’ll always be mine. Dacor can’t have you. No one can have you. You’re mine.”

“Keith. Stop.” Lance whispered, his grip on Keith’s body loosening, he pulled his head completely away from Keith’s lips, as much as he didn’t want to, because he had to. 

The two stopped.

“Let me down. Please.”

Keith reluctantly released his grip on Lance’s thighs but kept them tight around his back and returned to kissing him softly again just as Lance released his grip around Keith’s waist and jumped back onto his own two feet. 

“Lance.” Keith begged, trying to coax the red paladin to hold him tighter again but Lance just couldn't bring himself to do it. Lance’s arms stayed at Keith’s shoulders but they were so loose they could be blown off. “Lance, please.”

Lance shook his head and slowly Keith removed his lips and rested his forehead against Lance’s for just a second before pulling back to look at him. 

The two softly pulled away from each other to catch their breath and for just a minute, Lance allowed himself a moment of weakness where he rested his head softly on Keith’s shoulder and allowed his mind to wander the what if’s of their relationship.

What if they could make it work? What if they could fall in love with each other and make a proper go of it? What if they could be serious in space?

But Lance knew, had been hurt enough now, to know that those what if’s would cause him nothing but more pain if he didn’t seriously put an end to this confusing relationship him and Keith currently had.

So, Lance was strong. He slowly pulled away from Keith’s warm arms. Removed his head from his shoulder and dropped his hold on Keith’s rough hands until he was a few steps away. Keith couldn’t even look at him, proof that he knew that Lance was making the right decision. That Lance couldn’t move on while Keith continued them down this path with Lance following along blindly behind him.

“I’m sorry.” Lance whispered, he could hear his voice cracking from tears that were threatening to spill, but he wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t. He was strong enough, he knew him and Keith would be okay in the end. So, what was he really losing? A love that wasn’t even there.

“I’m sorry too.” Keith muttered in reply.

“Enjoy the rest of your night, Keith.” Lance pulled his jacket back into a respectable position and smoothed back down his hair before turning and heading back to the ball.


	12. Chapter Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I refuse to still be writing this story after season 6 comes out. I refuse! REFUSE!

The night passed by without much of a hitch, Lance returned to the great hall after his little disappearance with Keith and he did everything that was expected of him. He danced with the Prince, he danced with the townsfolk, he made nice with the diplomatic council and he was everything a paladin of Voltron was supposed to be. 

The Prince had seemed a little irked to have been run out on at first, but one quick “it’s an Earth custom to show respect to those of a higher standing” was enough to settle him. Maybe not Shiro but it's not like he asked so Lance didn't explain.

Lance caught eyes with Keith multiple times during the rest of the night and every time he did, he tried to shoot Keith with soft, caring smiles. The last thing Lance wanted was to erase his progress over the last few weeks with Keith so he tried to keep up a friendly, no drama, approach with him.

But Keith didn’t return his smiles, his face was surprisingly full of a great sadness that Lance didn’t understand. Maybe Keith had come to realise as well that they couldn’t continue the path they were heading. Hooking up while trying to save the universe came with a whole host of problems, and it was worse that Lance was in love with him, that brought multiple problems of it’s own along with it. 

So, Lance tried his best to ignore his presence even though he could still feel the former Red paladin’s eyes boring into his back as he continued to smooth talk, and saucy dance his way across the room. He tried to enjoy himself, and sure he had his moments, it’s not everyday you can say that you had a slut dropping competition against the Prince of an entire planet, the backing music being something you’d hear on a classical music album. It definitely was saved as a happy memory rather than a sad one, especially when Shiro was dragged in from the side lines, the Prince having a bit of a preference towards him as well as Lance. 

Soon, the party began to die down as citizens began their journeys back to their own homes. Lance found himself resting his head against Hunk’s thigh, spread out across three chairs just like he had during that Garrison welcoming party a few years ago. Lance felt his eyes grow heavy as they struggled to stay open but his mind too active for him to make his own swift exit into dreamland. That is until he felt a soft tap at his shoulders, coaxing his eyes open once more.

“Hello, Lance.” A familiar voice whispered, Lance smiled sadly as purple clouded his vision and he was slowly lifted to his feet, the warmth of Hunk’s body making an unacceptable exit.

“Dacor.” Lance smiled, taking in the tall blade’s sweet scent as he was pulled into a loose hold. “I thought I wouldn't see you again tonight.”

“I’ve got the information that was required and now Kolivan had instructed that he wants me back, the move is almost complete so he wishes my return within the next 9 quintants in order to help with the final tasks. Or, if you would prefer, in Kolivan’s language, that means to help unpack.” Dacor explained, wearing a faint smile of his own. “How was the rest of your night?”

“It was fine.” Lance wisped. “Though I spoke to the person who I- Well… I spoke to someone and it didn’t exactly go well but it’s fine now. I’ve realised a few things tonight now, Dacor, thanks to you.”

“Oh?” Dacor blinked in surprise. “And what was that?”

“Well… You’re right, Dacor. I am in love with someone else, they don’t love me but… I couldn’t do it to myself to forget that love just yet, I don’t think I’m ready.” Lance whispered. “I hope you understand.”

“Keith is a foolish man.” Dacor sighed but nodded nevertheless. “I’ll be sure to… how you say “kick his ass” for you once he returns back to headquarters. For your honour, red paladin.”

Lance was surprised that Dacor had worked Lance’s feelings out so easily but nevertheless a chuckle escaped through his lips at his friend’s words. “Thank you, Dacor.”

“Remember, my Lance, do not give up on love as I’m sure love has not given up on you. There is always hope. Whether in this universe, or another.”

“That’s very sweet.”

“That’s cheesy as shit!” Another voice suddenly chimed in from behind, Lance pulled himself from Dacor’s hold and turned to see the Green paladin, her suit jacket shed and was currently wrestling Hunk out of his jacket, not even looking at Lance.

“Problem, Mr Grinch?” Lance rolled his eyes as Pidge finally pulled Hunk’s jacket from him and wrapped it around her own body, giving the size difference the Jacket looked more like a cape, or maybe that she had been hit by a shrink ray and the only thing that stayed the same size was her jacket. 

“You’d think a Galra blade of Marmora would be able to come up with a line that doesn’t sound like it came out of a Nicholas Sparks book.” Pidge snorted, now choosing to jump and crawl up Hunk’s body like a spider monkey, the boy himself was just stood, moving his limbs to make Pidge’s movements easier.

Dacor blinked in confusion. “Nicholas S-Spa-”

“Don’t ask.” Lance sighed, turning away from his fellow paladins and back to Dacor. “Anyway, I won’t keep you from getting back to your base. You probably have to go.”

“Yes.” Dacor’s focus returned to Lance and he sighed. “I suppose I do. Well… I will keep in touch, Lance, as I hope you do with me. Good night.”

“Good night.” Lance leaned forward as Dacor leaned in as well, Lance assumed Dacor was going for his cheek so twisted his face to offer his cheek but it seemed Dacor had the same idea as he moved as if to go for Lance’s cheek but due to Lance’s moving ended up pressing his lips softly and chastly against his lips.

Both taken aback in surprise, the pair pulled back.

Dacor was a strawberry picture, immediately shifting from purple to red, not that Lance could blame him since he was exactly the same. Lance smacked his hand against face to try and hide the blushing but it was difficult since the red was pretty much everyone.

“W-Well. Good night to you all.” Dacor coughed before twisting on his heel and charging out of the room without another word. 

“Well wasn’t that fucking precious?” The evil gremlin snorted once more, forcing Lance to turn back to his friends and step forward, mostly to hide from his embarrassment. Pidge jumped down from Hunk’s body and stepped to the side as Lance moped forward.

“That was too much.” Lance mumbled. “My heart has been through enough tonight, that was just mean.”

Lance leaned forward into Hunk’s personal space, resting his head on his shoulder as his heart began to slow down.

Lance thought that he was going to be able to wallow in peace but a second later Hunk’s eyes gaze shifted behind Lance and immediately widened. “Uh oh.”

“What oh?” Pidge frowned, facing the same direction of Hunk. “Oh no.”

“What?” Lance whimpered and pulled back to face the direction of his fellow paladins but he immediately wished he hadn’t as he caught sight of what Hunk and Pidge were talking about. “Keith…”

The former black paladin stared back at him, a few seconds turned into a few moments as the two stared into each other’s eyes. Keith’s expression was almost unreadable, not happy, not sad, not angry.

They stared at each other just like that until Keith turned away and continued whatever it was he had been doing before, making his way over to Shiro and pulling him away to talk.

“Great.” Lance growled, falling backwards into Hunk’s preemptive waiting arms dramatically. “Just what I need. To be caught kissing some other guy when I just told Keith no more kissing.”

“Wow, Lance.” Pidge snorted, but they leaned forward and rested a calming hand on Lance’s back.

“Call me by my real name, Pidge. I am booboo the fool and I’m so ready to die.” Lance whined loudly, pushing himself into Hunk even further.

“Well you always have me.” Hunk smiled. “I don’t mind how many guys you kiss.”

“Thanks buddy.”

Not long after that, the paladins were ushered from the grand hall and back to the pod to carry them back to the castle. Words cannot describe the awkwardness that Lance felt, sitting directly opposite from Keith closest towards the doors out, so close that their knees were pressed up against each other and it didn’t matter how much the pair of them tried to pull back, they couldn’t stop the soft touch of their knees.

When they arrived back at the castle, Keith was out like a bullet. Not even bidding a single person good night before he began to sprint through the hangar and out and away. The rest of the team did stop to bid good night, Lance climbed up onto Hunk’s back as Hunk and Pidge spoke for a little while about matters that sent Lance’s mind into dream world.

“Lance.” Hunk whispered, calling Lance back. “Are you ready?”

“Mmmhh.” Lance grumbled as he looked up and saw that they were no longer in the hangar and were walking down the corridors, Pidge gone, as they reached the point where Hunk and Lance would have to part ways and make their way to their own rooms.

Hunk gently lowered Lance down to the floor and turned to gently hug him close.

“Night, baby.” Lance sleepily giggled as he placed a wet kiss of Hunk’s cheek, who responded as expected and wrapped his arms around Lance to squeeze him tightly, even if he was a bit grossed out with the wet kiss.

“Good night, dear.” Hunk chuckled into Lance’s neck before releasing him and the two stepped apart, Lance bid one final farewell over his shoulder as he began heading down towards his bedroom.

On his way, he began his approach to Keith’s room and for a second, he slowed to a stop outside and turned towards the door. Would it be a good idea to talk to Keith? Maybe it was just best to get it out of the way in private and who knows maybe they could kiss and make up and since they’re in a bedroom anyway, why waste the-

Lance immediately turned 90 degrees and quick stepped his ass away from Keith’s room. It was precisely thoughts like that that now needed to be targeted and eliminated. Like a Galra ship flying around Red’s ears like an annoying mosquito. 

He kept going and didn’t stop till he finally reached his own room and stripped himself from the remainder of his suit and jumped into bed, not even stopping the thoughts from drowning him.

He had to speak with Keith, that much was obvious. Lance didn’t want things to be awkward between the two of them, he’d loved how it had been these last few weeks and didn’t want to lose that. Before drifting off to sleep, that was the one thing he decided to do in the morning.

Talk to Keith.

Well, the intention had been there but the reality was somewhat darker. The next morning, Lance rose early, showered, did his entire skin care routine and dressed himself in his outfit from Earth, it seemed the most appropriate thing to be wearing for his conversation with Keith.

He speedwalked to the dining area, ready to grab Keith from his chair and drag him away but as he entered, he was surprised to see no sign of him. He frowned, disappointment hard to mask, as he sat down at the table.

Dragging would have to wait until Keith actually showed his face, so much for dramatic flare. So inconsiderate of Keith to interrupt Lance’s moment.

Lance sat, he talked, he made pleasants with his friends as he tucked into breakfast. It was only when he was beginning to finish when he began to worry that Keith still hadn’t shown his face yet. 

“So… Has Keith overslept again?” Lance gulped, trying to seem as casual as possible. All he wanted to do was talk to Keith about how the pair of them need to stop making out at inconvenient times and just try to remain friends… Unless Keith wanted to be more and that was why he’d tried it on again last night with Lance? But no that wasn’t probably the case, but still Lance had to find out and know the truth about whether or not Keith-

“My apologies, Lance, Keith has returned back to the blade.” Allura whispered. “Kolivan contacted us this morning to say they'd officially moved and Keith left practically straight away.”

The entire table fell into silence and five pairs of eyes turned to watch Lance’s reaction.

“O-Oh.” He gulped. 

“Sorry, buddy.” A reassuring hand from Hunk fell on his shoulder.

“He didn’t say goodbye is all.” Lance muttered. “Okay.”

Lance fell into silence and didn’t speak for the remainder of breakfast, then after breakfast he escaped to the training room before anyone could corner him. He trained through lunch until dinner, working out his frustrations and his irritations into a gladiator until he was soaked through with sweat, barely able to get his breath back before moving again and thoughts of raven hair were somewhat distant. It was only then that he made his way to dinner, not that he spoke to anyone, and then headed to bed after barely eating.

Days passed and Lance couldn’t get that painful feeling to leave his chest. He wasn’t sure what it was that was really affecting him, Keith and him had fought before, were known for it. It wasn’t like Lance was incapable of living without him, it was just that-

They hadn’t fought.

They hadn’t argued.

It was more like a deflated balloon. 

It was four days after Keith’s leaving that Lance couldn’t deny his feelings anymore and it was an awkward encounter that clarified Lance’s feelings. He hadn’t meant to snap, hadn’t meant to get so mad especially at his friends.

When Shiro brought up Keith at dinner, telling the team that he had called Shiro personal communications device earlier in the day to catch him up with everything going on at the blades. Lance hadn’t meant to come across to bitter but he could feel the green devil of jealous revealing his ugly head.

“If Keith is gone, maybe he should stay gone!” Lance had snapped, slamming his fork down on the table after barely touching his food again. “If you guys wanna talk about that guy then do it somewhere else.”

“Lance!” Shiro had immediately snapped back. “Keith is our friend! I understand that you’re a sad that’s he gone but that does not mean we have to be the ones dealing with your little temper tantrum.”

Lance immediately shoved himself away from the table and stomped out the room, stomping his feet like the child he felt himself becoming. He pushed out the kitchen, and down onto the ledge of the room, trying not to let his irritation consume and remember that it’s his friends, the ones who are always there for him, that he’s treating this way.

He was about to go back in, maybe to apologise, or maybe just to yell some more. But just as he was about to turn back, he caught voices coming from back inside. 

“This can’t continue, Allura.” Shiro sighed from inside. “This has been going on for days, he’s barely eating, he spends all day in the training room. This is not healthy.”

“Shiro.” Allura grumbled back, her voice short and final. “You need to try and understand what he’s going through. There’s nothing you can do to “fix this”, he just needs time and that’s what we are going to give him. As long as he needs.”

That was all Lance needed to hear. He wasn’t going to interrupt. It was sweet to know that Allura still had his back, and he knew Hunk and Pidge would as well so that just left Shiro on his own and right now, Lance couldn’t bring himself to change just to meet Shiro’s standards. He should be happy. Lance is finally doing the training regimine that Shiro always wanted.

The evening passed, Lance spending the entire time in his room. Then, when it came round to and Lance went to bed that night, he expected that sleep would come easy for him, that his exhaustion would finally push him to dream world, but no such luck. After several hours of staring up at his ceiling, his thoughts clouded by raven hair and lilac dusted eyes, he felt he had no choice but to stand up and leave, dragging his blanket along with him.

He walked aimlessly for a while, no real goal in mind. He first went to the kitchen and downed a water pouch in just a few seconds, he grabbed one of Hunk’s fresh batches of cookies from the cupboard and ate it in just a couple of bites but he still didn’t feel ready to go back to bed, so he made his way deeper into the castle until he reached a door that whooshed open upon his arrival.

Lance slowly made his way into the observation room, blanket tight around his shoulders before walking towards the windows. There was no where else he could think of to go, so why not go to the room that would help him realise his insignificance in the universe and maybe he’d get over himself just a little bit. He sat down carefully, the cold metal ground against his bare thighs sent a hard shiver across his body.

He sat there for a while, his mind wandering over everything that happened to him since he’d made that choice to save Shiro. Finding Blue. Coming into space and finding the castle, meeting the alteans. So many fights, so many lives to save. 

And Keith.

God, even now Lance couldn’t help but feel his heart swell for the boy. His morals, his ability, his kindness in the moments that really mattered. Plus, Lance wasn’t going to just ignore the fact that Keith was like one of Lance’s favourite wet dreams served up in tight black jeans and a crop top. But, no matter how much Lance wanted him, Keith would never be his.

“Jeez, put your angst away Lance, you’re going to hurt someone with that.” Lance grumbled aloud to himself before scooching his boot a little closer to the window so that he was able to see past his own reflection against the glass and out into the dark space. 

Colours of blue and purple galaxy’s wrapped around each other in the most perfect cosmic embrace, stars of every shade of every colour that has ever and will ever exist. It was good for Lance to take moments like this, to remember why he joined the Garrison in the first place. 

Space. 

Pidge often liked to remind Lance that most of space was empty, but Lance didn’t think so. This universe was so full from every expanding side in every single direction, perhaps a lot of space was quiet, not touched by the light of stars or the presence of planets, but nothing was ever truly empty.

Not even Lance himself. Sure, his feelings lately had made him want to feel like that, like without the love of Keith he was nothing, but that wasn’t true. Lance was still Lance. He was still the young cuban boy who fell in love with space. Who flirts a little too much with strangers. Who wants to adopt children with his best friend when he turns 40, regardless as to whether he’s married to someone or not, just because he and Hunk would be sick at co-parenting together. 

He was still the foolish olive skinned boy who always fell in love too fast but always bounced back afterwards, ready to fall for someone knew. Who knows, maybe this was the last time, maybe Keith was his last heartache. Perhaps the next time he falls in love it’ll be for real, and the feeling’s they will share will be so intense that he will forget all about the juvenile feelings that he’s experiencing now.

“Perhaps.” Lance whispered. “In another universe.”

Just before Lance had finished speaking, he heard the doors whoosh open behind him followed by the words. “What was that, Lance?”

Lance turned his head and caught sight of his paladin leader slowly entering the room. “Oh, Shiro. It’s you. Nothing. I was just thinking aloud.”

“Mind if I join you?” Shiro, crossed across the room slowly before stopping right beside him. “I was just leaving from speaking with Lotor when I saw your bedroom door was open so I came looking for you.”

“I suppose you’ve come to lecture me.” Lance whispered before he could even stop himself, he would’ve apologised for his bluntness but it didn’t seem like Shiro cared much for his comment so he didn’t bother.

Shiro regarded him strangely as he approached, towering above Lance’s quivering, cold form. “Of course not, why would you think that?”

Lance gulped, he hadn’t meant to open this up into a conversation... but he was here now, he had to follow through. “Well… Lately, that seems to be the only reason you ever talk to me.”

“They’re not lectures, Lance.” Shiro whispered, rubbing at his scar in what Lance could only assume was irritation, or maybe exasperation. “I know they seem like it but that’s not what they are. I’m just trying to push you, Lance.”

Lance raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow at his leader before turning back into space and looking out once more. “But why?”

“I push you for many different reasons, Lance.” Shiro sighed, slowly bending down until he was perching beside Lance on the cold hard floor. “The main one being is that I can see the potential in you.”

“Potential.” Lance immediately snorted, wrapping the blanket tighter around himself. “You think I’m a goofball, same as everyone else does around here.”

Shiro snorted back, catching Lance by surprise so he immediately turned back to his leader who was holding back a smile. “Well… You are a goofball. I’ve never met someone so infuriating aloof one hundred per cent of the time. You’re inability to take anything serious and flirtatious nature has got us into a number of sticky situations. Lets not forget your over compassionate personality has landed you in situations where you’ve required saving from either one of us or now the blade of marmora more than once.” 

Lance flinched at Shiro’s words but suddenly he felt a soothing hand resting upon his shoulder.

“But it has also gotten us out of a number of situations as well. Your friendly nature has allowed us to make better bonds with those in the coalition, you make it look so easy to establish friendships and it is something that I could never hope to achieve. Your selflessness. Your ability to find the light in even the darkest of times and help your fellow paladins through their own darkness, but it’s not just that Lance. Your skill and talent matches up to any one of us, you’re our sharpshooter, our battle strategist, our peacemaker. You do so much for this team and you’re right that I don’t give you enough credit.”

Lance gulped, too taken aback to know what to say.

“I push you because I am so determined to see what else you are capable of, you’re my second, Lance, and I know that the position was given to you due to Keith’s exit but you have more than filled that role in your own way. You hold this team together in times where we would all much rather fall apart. I am proud of the man you have become Lance.”

“I’ve hardly been much of man these last few days… Weeks.” Lance grumbled back. “I remind myself of my five year old nephew from back home.”

“Yes.” Shiro gulped, reaching up and stroking at his scar. “Allura filled me in one some small details about what’s been going on… So you’re in love with Keith?”

Lance visibly flinched, wanting nothing more than to end this conversation quickly and hopefully erase it from his memory. No way was he going to talk to Shiro about this. No way! NO way!

“And he has feelings for you as well.”

“What?” Lance almost choke on his laughter that immediately erupted from his throat as he took in Shiro’s words. “Keith? Shiro. Keith feels nothing for me. What are you talking about?”

“Perhaps, it isn’t that Keith feels nothing towards you.” Shiro explained. “But that you do not understand his actions of affection towards you.”

“Shoving me into dark corners, having his way, and then leaving and pretending nothing has happened isn’t particularly affectionate if you ask me.” Lance grumbled, again letting his thoughts take over his mouth for a second, unable to stop the words from coming out.

“Alright, I didn’t need to know that, but that isn’t what I meant anyway.” Shiro chuckled uncomfortably, rubbing his fingers over the long scar across his nose. “I meant the other things he has done for you.”

“Like what?”

“Like allowing you to stay in his own room while you were staying with the blade so that he knew where you were and that you were in the easiest place to not get lost in their HQ. Or immediately returning home after hearing that you had been seriously injured, and staying to make sure that you were alright the weeks following it.”

“Hunk had already told me that Keith came back because Kolivan made him.” Lance gumbled. “And that room was bare, I don’t believe that was Keith’s room at all.”

“Okay, fine, if you don’t believe me for those examples. How about, holding his tongue at the ball when he became jealous of you and Dacor because he could see how upset you were and his first priority was making sure you were okay.”

“That’s just a normal human thing to do.”

“Making excuses so that he only went on missions you were attending while he was back, begging me to only let him travel in the red lion with you at the controls and not even attempt to rekindle his bond with Black, and staying back at the castle when you were, when he could’ve easily joined me in the Black lion if he wanted. Leaving Voltron in the first place just so you didn’t have to step down as a paladin.” Shiro listed. “I could go on and on, Lance. Keith shows affection in his actions.”

Lance scoffed. “I don’t believe that any of that was for my benefit. He left Voltron to find his family, I don’t think he even wants to come back. Whenever we spent time together, everything always ended in a fight.”

“Lance.” Shiro rolled his eyes, his tone shifting from gentle to his dad voice immediately. “I have spoken with Keith many times about his feelings towards you. Has it occured to you that perhaps he is too afraid to start something serious? Given our daily lives, fighting and getting hurt then having to fight again before any of us has even properly healed. Never staying in one place for long enough to call it home.”

“Keith afraid of something?” 

“We’re all afraid of something, Lance. It is how we manage our fear that changes from person to person. Keith has suffered a lot of hardships, losing his family, losing me, being kicked from the garrison. There is only so many times someone can lose something before they start putting up walls in order to protect themselves from more pain. Why do you believe that Keith is not capable of that?”

“Well-” Lance fumbled for words. “It’s not that I don’t think he’s capable it’s just- well, Keith is- I just- Ugh. Keith is always so blunt, I’ve always thought that if he really cared about me then his feelings would be the same.”

“Being in love is a lot more complicated than that, you should know that yourself, Lance.” 

“As do you.” Lance muttered. “Are your reasons for distancing yourself from Allura similar to Keith’s reasons for distancing from me?”

Shiro spluttered, completely taken aback by Lance’s question, but as the two met eyes in the dark room, Shiro let out a deep sigh in defeat. “They are similar, I suppose, yes. Though we like to say that Allura is over 10 thousand years old, the reality is she is not. She has seen less years in this universe than I have and even though she is more wise and mature than someone like I could ever be. I have to respect the fact that when it comes to love, we are all naive. The last thing I want to ever do is hurt her but in the way this war has changed us, I fear if we remain together then it would cause nothing but hurt.”

“The damage has already been done, Shiro.” Lance whispered. “Regardless on whether you are together or not, our fates are written, if one of you were to get hurt, or gods forbid we lose one of you in this war, the other will still suffer that unimaginable pain that you are so afraid of. Why spend every day suffering because of a fate we don’t even know? When you could be happy, rely upon each other, love each other every day from today until your last days.”

“That was-” Shiro blinked in surprise. “That was quite poetic of you, Lance.”

“What can I say? I’m a Leo. But it still doesn’t change anything. Keith and I will never find common ground to walk upon where the both of us are happy.”

“You don’t know that for sure.” Shiro suddenly smiled sweetly. “Perhaps, given your logic, maybe that love is enough. You should talk to Keith.”

“I can’t. He’s back at his base by now, probably gearing up for his next mission.” 

Shiro chuckled mischievously. “I think he could be convinced to leave.” 

“What would be the point, Shiro?”

“Hope.” Shiro smiled. “Hope and love. Clearing through all the hidden emotions and missed moments. Just talking and honesty. Giving yourself to love in hope that love gives back.”

“Shiro, if you and Allura can’t do it then I doubt Keith and I could do it.”

“How about this, Lance?” Shiro sighed. “I promise to talk to Allura, I will tell her everything I told you and more. I will tell her my fears and insecurities, I will tell her that I’m sorry for the pain that I’ve caused her, but most importantly, I will tell her that I love her. But, I will only have the confidence to do that, if you do the same with Keith.”

“I- How would I even do that, Shiro? He’s galaxies away from here, and this isn’t really something I could do over a phone call.”

“Just leave that to me.”


	13. Chapter Thirteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Aye I'm sorry. Fake fan that I am hasn't found the time to write or even watch the newest season of Voltron yet so if this story now goes against something cannon (like I dunno, Shiro is actually trustworthy and not a dirty meddler in people's love affairs) then I don't even know it.
> 
> Word from the wise when you young ones all grow up. Don't get three jobs. You might think "the money is worth it" or "I can handle it" the answer to both is no. No.
> 
> I just want to sleep.
> 
> Please enjoy, I can't even make a promise about when the final chapter will come out. Just know that it will. I'm too stubborn to leave this story one chapter from finished.

Lance didn’t have much time to think the next morning. One minute, he was stretching at the end of his bed, the next, Shiro had entered and was dragging Lance out of the room and up to the bridge. Lance tried to fix his footing as he was pulled further away from his room but everytime he thought he’d caught his balance, one rough pull from Shiro had him struggling again.

“What are you-”

“Everything’s sorted.” Shiro interrupted, as the two entered through the bridge, Lance still just trying to stop himself from smacking face first onto the floor. “I’ve put clean clothes and food in Red for your journey. You have to go now otherwise Keith is going to get to the planet before you.”

“Planet? Keith? What are you-”

Before Lance could finish, Shiro almost threw Lance into his elevator, Lance stepped back to get closer to Shiro but he wouldn’t let him.

“No time!” Shiro screamed, his voice three octaves higher than usual, pushing Lance into the elevator fully without another word and sending the elevator down. 

It took awhile for Lance’s brain to catch up with him and realise that he was currently speeding towards, then entering his lion before Red took off without even Lance directing her but eventually he did manage to return to the present and it was not a happy reunion.

What was he even doing?

He could see the bag of food and clothes in the corner of Red that Shiro said he had left for him but that didn’t make this any easier. What had Shiro done? Had he ordered Keith to meet with Lance? Lance understood that their current predicament wasn’t exactly great for Voltron but wasn’t it a bit soon to be doing this?

Shiro and Lance had only spoken last night about everything and now Shiro said that everything was sorted. What did that even mean?

Lance looked at the GPS down on his dashboard, his journey seemed to be a long one. Well, nothing compared to if Lance was in an Earth made spacecraft, but it was still a 3 hour trek, but maybe that would be enough time for Lance to just… Run over his thoughts? Prepare a monologue to present to Keith when he showed up. If he showed up. There is a chance that Shiro is wrong and that Keith doesn’t want to meet and talk about this stuff… Their relationship. 

Well, it was definitely enough time to get out of these gross clothes and maybe clean up slightly. 

Lance pulled himself from his seat and walked over to the bag over in the corner, not that he was needed to control, it seemed like Red was two steps ahead of him and she didn’t need Lance telling her what she already knew. 

So Lance reached inside the bag without another thought about flying, and pulled out what must have been Shiro’s version of a joke.

First of all, Lance pulled out a pair of jean shorts which did nothing but trigger memories of being 14 years old on a date with his first guy who was in the year above him in high school. The date was nice, the shorts not so much. Then there was the tank top, the colour was okay, a cute fuschia colour but it looked like it was something Shiro would own given the size of it.

“What does Shiro think I am?” Lance gulped, taking hold of the ripped shorts and holding them against his front, they were a little short, no screw “a little” they were very short. 

Lance sighed, it’s not like he had much choice. He stripped quickly out of his sweaty stretching clothes and grabbed his packet of handy wipes he always had stored inside of Red just in case this very situation ever arose. Well not exactly this situation. When Lance had left the wipes in here all those months ago he had been more thinking about having to clean up to look presentable after he’d spent time with Keith. Not before. 

He’d had his fill of walk of shames with sweat soaked skin and matted hair through the castle. The wipes had been a necessary addition honestly.

He quickly grabbed a wipe and ran it down his body before grabbing another wipe and going over again to make sure that any sweat was completely removed. He personally would have preferred a shower, but it’s not like Shiro gave him a choice or any warning.

After wiping down, he quickly pulled the tank top over her head and let it fall, the top was ever longer than Lance had thought, going down to midway down his thighs. He then grabbed at the spare pair of plain boxers and pulled them up his legs next until he felt a little more comfortable.

Just as he reached for the shorts, Red’s comms opened and a voice called through.

“Lance! Come in, Lance!” Shiro’s voice suddenly called out. “Can you hear me?”

“Loud and clear, buttercup!” Lance called back from his current spot at the back of the cockpit, trying his best to pull the shorts up his legs without tripping over his own feet. 

“I saw Red take off. You’re on your way, correct?” Shiro asked, but Lance could hear almost a cheekiness in his tone.

“Yes. I am. But I’d love to be clued in on what’s going on Shiro!” Lance grumbled back as he fastened the shorts and headed back to his pilot's chair. “Also. When I get back. You're getting a lesson in fashion.”

“Allura actually picked out your clothes with the help of Pidge and Hunk. They all agreed that less clothing would do more good than bad when talking to Keith.”

“O-Oh!” Lance blushed but his tone was still miffed. “Oh so you're all clued in on this little trip are you?”

“Well if I'm honest. It was Allura’s idea. The two of us were up all night trying to work out how best to get you and Keith to meet and work everything out.”

“That little minx!” Lance snorted. “This isn't going to achieve anything guys! It's gonna take a lot more than one conversation for Keith and I to be friends again.”

“Boy.” Shiro chuckled back. “You and Keith have never been ‘friends,’ the pair of you went from bickering children to bickering children who occasionally did things kids should not be doing. But I believe there is a chance for the two of you to push past all of that and become something new. And exciting.”

“I swear to the gods, Shiro. You better keep an eye on that robotic arm of yours because one day I'm going to remove it and slap you with it.”

“Lance-”

“The ultimate bitch slap.” Lance snapped back before Shiro could interrupt with his weird ramblings again. “If today goes bad I'm holding all of you guys personally responsible for your meddling in my love life.”

“You've meddled in ours. We all thought it only fair.”

Lance gasped in offence. “When have I ever-”

“Allura and I talked through everything by the way and we've agreed that what you said was right, Lance. Were not “official” but we aren't going to forget everything that happened between us before like it never happened and just see where we can go from there.”

“Okay, I'm glad to-”

“Also Hunk finally got in touch with Shay yesterday after all your badgering and the two of them are still going strong long distance but we are going to schedule some time in to go visit the Balmera in the next coming weeks.”

“That's also good-”

“Also Pidge has asked you to stop setting her up with ever pretty alien girl we meet. If she wants to chat to someone she's fully capable to do it herself.”

“... I don't meddle with any of you.”

“If you say so, Lance.”

Lance huffed, crossing his arms over his chest like a spoilt child. He only meddled where his input was necessary. It's not his fault that his friends are a bunch of love fools with no love skills.

“Also Lance, before you land I just wanna say something to you.” Shiro suddenly coughed. “That I don't think I made abundantly clear yesterday.”

“Shoot.” Lance cocked his head as if twisting his ear towards the comms would help him hear better even though he could hear just fine.

“I'm sorry, Lance. I'm sorry that I've been pushing you too hard. You are a strong, capable member of Voltron and I should have known that the way I was treating you was both demoralising and infantising at time… Especially that time we came and got you from the Marmora. It is easy to forget sometimes that I'm not your commander… Nor am I your dad. At the end of each day, Lance, I am your friend above all else.”

“O-Oh!” Lance spluttered slightly before composing himself. “Thank you, Shiro. That means a lot.”

“You're welcome.” Shiro’s tone eased and a gentle chuckle filled Reds cockpit, Lance immediately smiled back at the sound. “Now. Go seduce the pants of our fellow paladin would you? I expect you to pull out all of your best moves, Loverboy Lance.”

“S-Shut up!”

Lance immediately cut the call without another word and sat back in his chair, mulling over the conversation with Shiro. He seemed so sure that this was going to go well but if Lance was honest with himself he knew he was heading somewhere for an argument.  It wasn't fair that Lance was constantly bringing all this up, regardless of Keiths real feelings. Keith clearly didn't want a relationship and Lance was coming across as pushy and needy all the time.

He didn't want to meet with Keith now, Shiro and the others had taken Lance's choice away from him, Lance wanted to wait until Keith was back and even then maybe not even ever bring it up again. It would fade into old news and one day Keith and Lance would be able to laugh about their weird past and Lance's almost creepy obsession with him.

But, like he said, his choice was gone. Might as well get the fight over with, crush Lance's heart just one more time so he can finally heal and move on.

… Lotor is kinda hot?

In a- malicious murderer who cannot be trusted but probably knows how to boss someone around in the most sexy way- kind of way.

Or “hardly marriage material” like how his mother would put it.

Oh well. Future conquests can be future Lance's fun. Right now, present Lance can worry about a little stress and a lot of heartache about to hit him like a bomb to the back of his head.

“... Now we wait.” Lance gulped. 

Two hours passed. Two hours of stress eating every little bit of food Shiro has provided, which included the food for the journey back as well, and stress dancing to old songs from his childhood he could remember and sang aloud as Red continued to fly solo towards a destination unknown to Lance. 

With a belly full of both food and butterflies, Lance sat back in his chair and watched as a planet materialised in the distance and Red altered her course to head right towards it. Lance looked down at the console as the planet popped up on his GPS and clicked on it for its details.

“Histerion?” Lance frowned as he read the words that appeared on his screen out loud. “Once a planet inhabited by the Histor culture, it is now an abandoned planet due to its intense weather changes across its 48 cycle long year. Where 20 cycles are spent with extreme typhoons and 20 cycles with extreme heat and drought. The remaining 8 cycles are the only days where the planet is somewhat habitable with a desert like climate that max to 38 degree Celsius (100 fahrenheit) heat.”

Lance frowned. Hopefully Shiro has researched this planet and sent him on one of the good 8 days and he wasn't going to get blown into a hurricane or something. 

“Due to its weather, the Histor culture unable to evolve to meet their needs on their planet eventually became extinct, there are no other native species living on the planet however it is possible to find short term visitors who visit the planet during its habitable 8 cycles in order to collect the bountiful amount of Jolgi leaves, a medicinal plant known for its hallucinogenic and pain relief for numerous species across the nearby galaxies. In addition, the plant has also been known to counteract symptoms from  _ Formicatia Mosquiti  _ insects (more commonly known as love or truth bugs) located on other planets in the galaxy”

Lance swiped the screen away, bored, and sat back as Red started closing in, slowing her speed as she reached the upper atmosphere and plummeted down without a pause or warning to Lance who just had to hold on for dear life and not fall out of his chair.

Thankfully the journey didn't last much longer as Red angled herself perfectly like the agile cat on her feet she was and lowered herself down to open her doors.

“Great. Thanks girl.” Lance snorted. “Next time can you clue me in on everything yourself rather than just do what Shiro tells you and keep it a secret from me? Just a thought, no pressure.”

Red chuffed back as if she was laughing at Lance's misfortune as he readied himself to leave. Still slightly uncomfortable in what he was wearing but it's not like he could go back to the castle now for a quick change.

Or maybe he could! Just do a quick escape, Lance could make up some excuse and Keith could just head back to the blades as if nothing had happened and BOOM! No drama to be had here. 

Red pushed at the bond between the lion and paladin which in Lion language probably meant “Just get out and find him, Lance.”

So Lance did. He exited his lion quick March and as soon as he entered the hot atmosphere of Histerion he suddenly felt just a slight appreciation for his outfit because HOLY COW it was hot!

Lance wasn't much of a sweater, he'd been blessed by a family who were native to hotter climates countries even though he himself had mostly grown up in Midwest America where the heat tended to be pretty easy to handle. But, if anything could make him sweat, he felt like Histerion could do the job. Even midsummer Cuba didn't used to feel as hot as this. 

Lance had no idea where he was going so he just kept walking, he could feel his bond with Red at the corner of his mind so if he moved off course he knew she'd correct him so he just kept walking until he felt like he couldn't walk anymore. Wading through the weird desert like sand that felt… almost too squishy beneath his feet? Like tiny pillows getting inside his shoes rather than earth's heavy exfoliating sand that grazed your dead skin all the way down to the bone.

Eventually, Lance felt Red push at their bond so he took that as a sign to stop and immediately threw himself down on the soft sand. He probably still had a bit of a weight so he might as well just sit and catch his rays.

Histerion didn't have a sun but for some reason it was bright and hot as Lance's own personal hell, he could only hope that he wouldn't be punished later for skipping out on the sun cream. Can the gods bless him this once? Lance is due a little good luck afterall.

Lance laid back, resting his arms beneath his head and closed his eyes to block out the light. His head was swimming with a million thoughts, what he has to say to Keith, what Keith would say to him. Would Keith even stick around long enough to listen?

It was hard to keep his mind awake in this heat, one minute he was there sitting on the squishy sand, the next he was floating in and out of consciousness.

_ “Mijo? Mijo, where are you?” _

_ Lance turned around, he knew where he was but yet, he couldn’t place it’s meaning. What was this place? A green grass field surrounded by tall trees that seemed to kiss the sky. _

_ “I’m here, mama.” Lance’s voice answered back but he hadn’t even opened his mouth. _

_ “Mijo, I’ve been worried sick. You shouldn’t scare your mother like that.” _

_ Lance turned once more and finally met the eyes of the voice, eyes so familiar that he was almost ashamed that he hadn’t recognised the voice from before. Before him, dressed in one of her favourite sky blue moomoos was his beautiful, caring mother. She stepped forward and circled her arms around him to pull him close. _

_ “Lance. My Lance. I’ve missed you so much.” _

_ “I-I-” Lance stuttered, too in shock to be able to form any real words which was made harder by the fact that he had so much to say, so much to tell her.  _

_ She looked older, her hair a little bit more grey than the day he last saw her. Her frown lines were deeper and she’d lost weight, so much so that when Lance held her back she felt more like flesh and bones rather than his own mother.  _

_ “Silly boy.” His mother stepped back and gently tapped him across the head. “Where’s your brain? Forgetting to call your poor mother for so long. You’re lucky I don’t lock you in your room so that you can never leave my house again.” _

_ Lance winced and looked down at the ground. “I’m… I’m sorry, mama.”  _

_ He knew this was a dream, and he knew that this wasn’t a memory. Somehow, his mother had reached him… Knowing his own mother he wouldn’t be surprised if she had actually astral projected herself across the stars just to tell Lance off. _

_ “My son.” A hand fell upon his cheek. “You do not need to be sorry.” _

_ “But mama-” _

_ “I understand. I know you are doing something great and I couldn’t be more proud of you. I just… I miss you. So much.” _

_ “I miss you too.” Lance pulled his mother close again and rested his head in the crook of her neck, a difficult task since Lance was nearly two heads taller than his mother.  _

_ “I know, Mijo. We will see each other again, and I trust that you are doing everything you can to be happy. Don’t worry about us, we are safe, thanks to your bravery.” _

_ “I love you mama. I will see you soon. I promise. I will come home.”  _

_ “My son, you are making your own home now. You’re at an age where you must make decisions for yourself, make yourself as happy and fulfilled with your own life as you can. Do not worry so much about getting back to us, we understand you are on a new, exciting path now.” _

_ “Okay mama.” _

_ “You promise?” _

_ “I promise.” _

_ “Okay good.” His mother took a few steps away, Lance could see the tears falling down from her own eyes now but they didn’t last last as she quickly swept them away and pressed her hands down on her hips. “So what’s this I hear about you having a man now? You treating him good? He treating you good?” _

_ “Mama.” Lance blushed. “It’s not- We’re not-” _

_ “I expect you to bring him to meet us as soon as you get home or else I am going to slap you so hard your head spins. Do you understand?” _

_ “I- We-” Lance groaned, throwing his head back in exasperation. “Yes mama. I will.” _

_ “Good. Now wake up, I don’t remember raising such a lazy son. Rise and shine, Mijo.” _

_ “I love you, mama.” _

_ “I love you too, Lance. My Lance.” _

“Lance.” The voice whispered inside his head. “Lance.”

Suddenly, pictures faded to white and white faded to blinding yellow as his eyes opened and the light from Histerion blinded up slightly, but the voices didn't stop, sounding too far away in his head to not be real.

“Lance!” A voice shouted again loud from behind.

Lance slowly turned, his heart beating a thousand times per second as he caught sight of the previous Red paladin sprinting towards him.

It was Keith.

Lance jumped up to his feet in concern, Keith wasn’t even slowing down, he just kept sprinting getting closer and closer until he reached out his arms and literally tackled Lance to the ground.

“Keith?” Lance gasped, slightly winded. “What are you doing?”

“Are you alright? Where are you hurt? Who did this to you?” Keith blurted out immediately, Lance regarded him strangely as the paladin perched himself down on Lance’s chest, checking every inch of him, pulling at his suit, removing his helmet, yanking at his limbs.

“What do you mean? I’m fine? What are you talking about?”

“What am I-” Keith growled, rechecking everything he had just checked. “Shiro said that you’d been kidnapped and that you were hurt and that they couldn’t get to you. What are you doing here? Where’s Red?”

Lance frowned in confusion. Shiro had lied to Keith?

“Keith, I’m fine.” Lance whispered, still winded from the tackle and from Keith sitting on top of him, pointing back over his head as best he could in the direction of his lion. “Red’s over there. Nothing has happened.”

“But Shiro said-”

“I-I guess Shiro lied.” Lance whispered, Keith wasn’t going to like this and unfortunately Lance was the only one here to take his reaction. “To get you to meet me here.”

“What?”

Lance gulped nervously. “Shiro wants the two of us to talk and he said he’d handle getting you here. I didn’t know he’d lie.”

Keith immediately ripped himself from Lance’s body, not being gentle at all with Lance as he pushed himself up on to his feet and away from Lance. “Seriously? What? Do you two think that’s funny? I left in the middle of a mission briefing and got here as fast as I could because I thought you were injured. What- and you’re just fine? Lance what have I sa-”

“This was Shiro’s idea, you wanna blame someone, blame him. I thought he just asked you and you reluctantly agreed.” Lance whimpered, sitting back up and standing to his feet slowly, dusting the space sand from his ass.

“So what? What do you want?” Keith grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest. “Since I’m here you might as well say it.”

“I w-wanna talk.” Lance whispered.

Keith blinked at him in surprise but no less irritated than before. “Talk? You wanna… Talk? Lance, you know I have a transmitter device right? You could’ve just called?”

“No, I know.” Lance gulped. “I just feel like this is something we should talk about face to face.”

“This isn’t about us, is it?”

“It is.”

“Lance, I told you-”

Lance held his hands up to stop him. “I know, I know, but there’s stuff I’ve never told you. I want us to just get everything out, be absolutely honest with each other and work out how we’re going to move on from this. We can’t just continue the way we’ve been Keith. It’s not good for Voltron. It’s not good for ourselves.”

Keith sighed, silent for a moment ad he probably pondered the likelihood of this conversation going well (which was unlikely granted) before he sighed again in defeat. “Whatever, fine, since I took the pod all the way here anyway. Let me just contact my fellow blade who came with me.”

“You didn’t come alone?”

“Well since I thought your life was in danger, I asked Kolivan for backup.” Keith snapped back immediately. 

Lance recoiled and nodded his head in understanding as Keith grabbed a communicator from his pocket and pulled it up to his lips before muttering something down into the receiver, a grunting reply came back a few seconds later and now Lance felt embarrassed and awkward. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all, he should just let Keith get back, they can talk another time it doesn’t have to be now. 

But it didn’t look like Keith was giving him a choice now as the shorter boy tucked the communicator back into his pocket and turned to Lance with a stern look on his face.

“So.” Keith sighed. “Where do you wanna start?”

“I… I’m not sure. I’ve never actually done this before.” Lance gulped. “I suppose it’s like a band aid right? You just rip it off.”

“I don’t know, Lance, this was your stupid idea.”

“Actually it was Shiro’s stupid idea, I didn’t want to do this, not now anyway. I wanted to wait until you came back to the castle again and then just quickly breeze over it.”

“You keep calling this an ‘it’, can you just spit it out already? I have to get back to the base, Lance.”

“It’s not something I can just spit out, Keith!”

“It’s not something anyway. It’s a nothing. It’s irrelevant.” Keith threw his hands up in anger, his voice raising multiple octaves, so much so that Lance could stop his voice from doing the same.

“Oh well you would think that, wouldn’t you? Mister Emo who doesn’t like to show any sort of emotion unless they’re dripping from the end of his sword.”

“What is that supposed to mean?!”

“You know full well what I mean!”

“I do not! So why don’t you explain it to me, McClain?”

“You know what? No! Stop! We’re not going to get anywhere if we keep arguing!” Lance growled in frustration, dropping the conversation immediately. “That is not what I wanted to talk about.”

“Okay fine. Then get on with it.”

“Okay. Fine… Listen, I- I had a dream… Before you arrived.” Lance gulped, rubbing anxiously at his arm. “About my mother.”

“From Earth?” Keith raised an eyebrow. 

“Yeah. Ever since finding Blue, I’ve tried to keep my family at the back of my mind. It hasn’t always been easy and sometimes I’ve been unable to forget about them completely but… I haven’t really dreamt about them or allowed myself to think about them in a very long time. So long that sometimes I forget some of the important details, my house, the details of their faces, memories we’ve shared together.”

“Well, what happened in the dream?”

“My mother, she- Well, she said she didn’t hate me for leaving and that she was proud of me. I know it was just a dream and for all I know my mother doesn’t feel that way at all about me now but… It was a nice thing to hear.”

Keith crossed his arms over his chest as the two stood there, staring at each other with almost blank expressions. “Your mother won’t hate you, Lance. We will find a way to get back in contact with Earth and you will be able to hear her for real. Not just a dream.”

“No I know. I’m not so worried about that anymore.” Lance gulped. “I just… Miss them. A lot. I wish they were part of my life now.”

“I understand.”

“Which is why I want you to find your family. More than anything. I’d never want to be the one to stand in your way of finding your home. I… I’m in love with you, Keith.”

Keith leant back in shock, his eyes widened accordingly. 

“All I want is for you to be happy, and if being with the Blades makes you happy then that’s something I can and have accepted. I won’t ever force you to be someone you’re not and I will do everything I possibly can to help you find whatever it is you’re looking for, no matter what it costs.”

“I-” Keith gulped. “I didn’t know you felt that way.”

“Well that’s fair enough. It’s not like I’ve ever told you that before now.” Lance sighed, he could feel his emotions welling up inside him to the point where they were exhausting. Without another word, he threw himself down into the sand and crossed his legs beneath him.

“I’m… I’m sorry, Lance.”

“No it’s okay- I know it’s a dick move to drop all this on you. I’m not expecting anything in return, I just… Want to say it.”

“No not that. I'm sorry for how I've been acting.” Keith mumbled, sitting down beside Lance on the fake-sand. “I've… I've been a real asshole.”

“Mmh.” Lance mumbled but made no other motion to speak, giving Keith his chance now since Lance had been the one mostly speaking this entire time now. 

“When I came back after you were… injured. Shiro gave me a real bollocking. I’d come back because I was worried, no one would tell me the extent of your injuries or if you were even going to be okay so I had to rush back to the castle, you’re my friend Lance, I didn’t want to lose you which I was a million miles away doing god knows what. I told Shiro about you and I pretty soon after we started, he wasn’t particularly supporting but he wasn’t against it either, but I also told him how I ended us before I joined the blades, that he wasn’t supporting of at all, in fact he told me I was stupid.”

Lance chuckled to mask the pain welling up inside him, the “break up” (if it can even be called that) was rough, Keith hadn’t even really done it, he’d just ignored Lance expecting him to get the message. “I doubt it was stupid. You should do what makes you happy at the end of the day, Keith. I understand that.”

“Well it didn't make me happy. At all.”

“Okay. Maybe a little stupid then.” Lance sighed, pushing his shoulder against Keith's. “Why weren't you happy?”

“Because you weren't.” Keith muttered reluctantly. “I thought you'd be angry, would hate me and get over it so that I could to but you were just… So understanding yet so sad.”

“Well I couldn't be angry. You were doing something you felt you needed to do.” Lance shrugged. “I couldn't blame you for that.”

“You could have. It's not like we were official. We could've just bid each other farewell for now and picked up when I got back. But I made the decision to pretend like it never happened, like there was nothing between us and-” Keith stopped himself as his voice began to get higher and higher. “That's the past. I suppose that doesn't matter now.”

“It does matter Keith. How can we move on if we don't… move on?”

“Lance. Come on. Look, you and I, we've- We’ve only really connected when we’ve been angry at each other.” Keith blushed.

Lance sighed, he didn’t invite Keith here to beat around the bush, if they wanted to fix this they had to talk, properly this time. “By connected do you mean fucked?”

Keith hissed but didn’t disagree. “Is that the kind of life you want with me? Just arguing, sleeping together and then arguing again all the time?”

“I don’t think that’s how it would be, Keith.” Lance sighed. “Do you remember that night, not long after Shiro returned when you asked me what I thought about you going to join the blades to train? Do you remember how we talked, and we joked, and we laughed, and we messed around? That’s the kind of life I want for us. Trusting each other, being able to be ourselves around each other.”

“But… I… I just-”

“I didn’t invite you here to make you choose. It’s not ‘date me’ or ‘never speak to me again.’ That’s not how I want to sound.” Lance whispered. “I want us to be okay, regardless on whether we choose to stay friends, or if we try to give it a go, or we decide to just let that time in our lives go. Before anything else, I want my buddy back.”

Keith gulped in surprise, but because he didn’t go to speak, Lance continued.

“We are capable of amazing things, Keith, I don’t know if you remember but we were amazing when you were in Black. Me and you, a team, when we were in our lions I never thought about what would happen when we got home, having you in my bed or being in yours. On the field, it was Lance and Keith, space partners and that was all that matters. That is the only thing I want from you. Everything else is up to you.”

For a while, the two fell into complete silence, sat beside each other on the sand and Lance thought that this was it. That the two of them would never be able to get over this point and they'd be stuck forever in limbo. But before Lance could let himself be brought down, Keith suddenly pushed himself against Lance's side and rested his head on Lance's shoulder.

“I miss you.” Keith whispered. “I miss being around you, every day. Your energy is so positive and infectious it makes me want to be the best version of myself I possibly can be. I only became the black paladin because you convinced me. I only joined the blades because you told me it was okay to want something for myself.”

“And it is-”

“Without even knowing it… You ended up meaning more to me than I ever thought you would. Seeing you sad, arguing with you, being away from you… Realising the feelings Dacor had for you, regardless of distance or the fear of losing you in this war, I've never felt a pain like that. I don't think ever. It made me realise how much of a coward I really am.”

Lance nodded slowly to Keith's words before leaning down and softly pressing his lips to the top of Keiths head. “I won't force you to do anything. Ever. I don't want you to feel pain. So I'm leaving this one up to you Keith, one last time. If you tell me no, I won't fight it anymore, I'll accept it and I'll move on from you. We can move on.”

“I-I-”

Silence.

“I don't want that.”

“Then what do you want?”

Slowly Keith pulled away, before pulling at Lance's tank top, Lance moved with the motion until Keith positioned him in his lap, his bare knees on either side of Keith’s thighs.

“This.” Keith suddenly choked out, his voice so hoarse Lance could barely hear him. “I want us.”

...

“Huh?”

“This, Lance.” Keith cleared his throat, this time looking a lot more determined as he spoke. “I want us to give this a try. If you'll still have me.”

“Okay. Okay.” Lance suddenly leaned back, he reached up and ran his fingers anxiously through his own hair. “Cool. Cool. Cool. Cool. Cool. Awesome. Love it. Okay.”

“Lance?”

“I'm fine!” Lance was not fine. His voice had jumped three octaves, his face was beet red and he's pretty sure his heart hasn't been working for like a solid five minutes now. “I'm Gucci. I'm Ted Baker, eat your heart out.”

“Lance…” Keith whispered again, and like a rock it almost grounded Lance who felt like he was losing all of his gravity keeping him tied to this planet. “Are you sure this is what you want? That I'm what you want? After everything we’ve gone through and could still go through.”

Lance gulped and allowed himself a second to catch his breath before wrapping his arms around Keith's shoulder. “Yes. More than anything. I'm sure.”

“Okay.” Keith smiled, his pearly white peeling out over his lips as he couldn't help but smile even wider. “Okay. Great. That's amazing. Okay. So. Yeah. Dates. Dating. Let's do this.”

Lance nodded back, also now struggling to contain his smile as he pulled Keith into a tight hug and held him there as if, if he let go, Keith would float away from him into the atmosphere. The thought alone made Lance smile even harder until he felt himself begin to giggle, and then chuckle, then laugh, and then full belly roar into Keith's shoulder unsure why he started but completely unable to stop.

“Why are you laughing?” Keith laughed back.

“S-Sorry!” Lance gasped for breath. “I can't stop! I don't know why I'm laughing!”

Keith was trying to give that macho, emo lack of emotion but it was pretty hard for him to do when he was also laughing. “You're so ridiculous, why do I love you?” 

...

The laughter stopped.

“What?” Lance pulled back immediately to stare at Keith who honestly looked like he was about to take off and run.

...

“Nothing.” Keith blushed deep red, fidgeting from side to side, avoiding looking anywhere but at Lance.

But Lance was shook. He gently reached to Keith’s cheek and turned him to look at him. “You, what, me?”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“You did.” Lance gawped. “You said… you love me? You love me.”

“That’s not what I said.” Keith’s frustration began to rise but then again so did the pink in his cheeks.

“It is!” Lance couldn’t stop the giggles from erupting from him once more. “You love me.”

Keith finally looking to Lance like a deer in headlights, completely confused and frightened of Lance’s joyful reaction.  “Lance, shut up!”

“You love me! You love me! You love me!” Lance chanted, pumping his fists into the air. “I can’t believe it, Keith Kogane loves me!”

“Okay fine shut up!” Keith grabbed at Lance’s wrists holding them tightly in front of him so he’d stop fisting them into the air. “I said it now will you stop?”

“Keith.” Lance almost felt like he was going to cry. “Say it again? Please. Please say it.”

Keith regarded him strangely and for a moment, Lance deflated because he thought Keith wasn’t going to say it again, but as soon as Keith felt Lance’s reaction he leaned forward. Resting his forehead against Lance’s he took a deep breath before softly whispering.

“I love you, Lance.”

“... I love you too. Keith.”

For the next half a vargas, the two sat together like that, just staring at each other, occasionally brushing their lips against one another to make sure that this was real, that the other was truly here with them. 

But, eventually the dream had to come down as Keith’s communicator began to buzz in his pocket.

“We’ve been gone an hour. I should really just update my partner really quick.” Keith sighed, gently twisting Lance out of his lap and pressing another quick kiss to his head. 

Lance sighed as he fell back first into the sand and watched Keith as he stood up and grabbed the communicator from his pocket, pulling it to his lips to speak again, the same grumbling reply came a few seconds after and Keith nodded before pushing the communicator away once more.

“I just had to check in to say what’s going on, and I’ve told him we shouldn’t be too much longer. We will have to get back to base soon, big mission coming up, in fact I think Kolivan is going to contact Allura for information before the mission goes ahead.”

“I understand.” Lance smiled as Keith reached out a hand to him which Lance grateful took and was pulled up to his feet.

“So what do you wanna do now?”

Lance thought to himself for a moment before a thought struck him and he felt his cheeks burn.

“How much time do you have before you have to go back?” Lance blushed, holding tighter to Keith’s hand.

Keith frowned, regarding him strangely. “Maybe half a vargas more or so. I don’t want to keep my fellow blade away for much longer just sitting doing nothing.”

“Have you got time to come back to Red?”

“I can walk you back, yeah.”

“And come in?”

“Come in?” Keith frowned. “Umm… Yeah, why?”

“Okay.” Lance blushed even harder as he slowly stood to his feet, wasting no time before pulling Keith up to his feet and the pair walking back to the Red lion. 

They walked in a happy silence, or at least Lance was because the entire walk back Keith kept a tight hold of his hand all the way to Red and even on the climb into the cockpit when Lance finally pushed Keith down into the seat.

“I can drive you back to your ship.” Lance whispered. “That gives me a few extra minutes.”

“Extra minutes to do what?”

“Well. This. Of course.” Without another word, Lance lunged forward and captured Keith's lips in his own.

There was no sweetness, no softness that the situation probably needed because every second longer Lance spent with Keith he could feel the reality seeping in. The gods were going to give Lance a chance.

And Lance is one man y'know, one young man in love with another. And he hasn't been allowed to enjoy a single moment with Keith for months so hell yeah is he going to enjoy every second he has now.

Which first means stripping Keith out of his clothes.

“You should take this off.” Lance purred after removing his lips from Keith's just to trail them down his neck as Lance slowly lowered himself down onto his knees. “You must be roasting in this suit.”

Keith couldn't get a single word out as Lance reached around his back to the zip of his suit and slowly pulled it down, continuing to trail kiss after kiss on Keith's skin.

When the zip reached the bottom, Lance then got to work pulling the fabric from Keith's shoulders and down until his entire chest was exposed. 

Lance sat back and smiled at the sight. Keith had definitely filled out more since they last did anything like this. Skin to skin.

Speaking of. 

“I'm hot too. And I'm not talking about how attractive I am. For once.” Lance smirked as he made quick work pulling his own tank up and off leaving him exposed other than the skimpy shorts that the tank had been hiding this entire time anyway.

As soon as Lance was stripped out of his shirt he leaned in again and continued to drape himself over Keith’s body as if, if he let go for just a second, Keith would fade away again.

“Wait Lance!” Keith suddenly gulped as Lance’s trailing hands made it down to the suit pooling at his waist, hoping to pull the suit further down and preferably throw it 50 feet from Keith’s body. “Shouldn't we wait?”

“Do you want to wait?”

… “Well no. But don't you?” Keith spluttered in embarrassment as Lance continued to trail his lips up and down Keith's chest.

“It's nothing we haven't done before. And we haven't done this for a while.” Lance smirked up at him. “But if you don't want to do this yet, I won't push you. Just an idea is all.”

“Are you joking?” Keith gawped, coughing until his face shifted into determination. “I want this. Don't hold back, Loverboy.”

Fooling around with Keith was like riding a bike. You never forget… and sometimes if you're in too much of a hurry it's a pain in the ass.

Falling in love with Keith is much the same. One minute, you're innocently blowing your worst enemy in a supply closet to burn off stress, the next you're eating space ice cream at 4am because you can't sleep without the feeling of his hands wrapped around your waist, pulling you in close.

Now, there's no time to focus on the past. With Keith so close now he can pretend he never felt that hurt, or rather that the hurt was merely a stepping stone to where they going to go, destination unknown. Sometimes it's hurts, sometimes it doesn't but the main thing is never forgetting. Never forgetting this feeling right now of Keith pushing his way inside him, kissing down Lance's neck as Lance tries his best to look into Keith's eyes but the feeling is too good it's hard not to look up into space and thank whatever space gods are out there for Lance's present predicament.

“I love you.” Lance whispered, pressing his lips once more to Keith’s as Keith pressed so snugly inside him. “God, I love you so much.”

“I know.” Keith grunted, the boy clearly trying to refrain himself from cantering his hips like he normally would when they slept together.

He’s really trying. Trying to be gentle, to go at Lance’s speed. Trying to convey everything he's felt in the way he touched, the soft brush of one hand against Lance’s cheek, the other rubbing small circles with his thumb into Lance’s hip. Curling his hips just so that Lance could feel every inch of him, not a moment of pain. No pain, not anymore. Just that softness that Lance never knew he wanted this entire time.

Shiro was right, Keith wasn’t really a man of words. His actions spoke louder than anything he could ever say to Lance. 

“I love you too, Lance.”

But the words were still nice to hear.


	14. Chapter Fourteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry for the short chapter, I just wanted to get this last chapter out and finish this story. There is one scene between Shiro and Lance that I chose to cut out mostly because I've heard some spoilers for Season 6 and I didn't want this chapter to seem any weirder than it already did.
> 
> Little info - This chapter is set post Season 5 but pre season 6 (since y'know I still haven't found the time to watch it)
> 
> Also just a quick one. Thank you to everyone who read and commented on this story, I'm not very big on posting stuff that I write anymore so writing this was a challenge nearly the entire way but I'm really glad I did and I'm even more glad that I finished it. So yeah, maybe it will encourage me to release more stuff... I have like two other voltron stories that I've written a lot of but never posted so who knows? Maybe one day they will see the light of day. 
> 
> Thank you again and enjoy the final (short) chapter.

Months passed after the events on Histerion and everyday felt like a new day of happiness for Lance. Sure, he still had his normal down days, which most consisted of self pity from missing his family, earth and not even having his boyfriend around on a constant basis to keep his mind of things.

But. Lance had come to accept that it was okay. His bounce back from bad days was almost twice as fast as they used to be, it helped that things on the team were really starting to calm down. 

That whole thing with Lotor? Being good. Lance could never have seen that one coming. Learning to trust the Galran prince was a hard task, especially when he was making googly eyes at Allura all the time but she didn’t seem to mind too much. Her mind was much too occupied on their Black Paladin.

Shiro… Well Shiro was a factor of Lance’s worries of his own. He’d thought after Histerion that everything would be fine but there are still some things that grind Lance’s gears. Like that Kral Zera thing. It seemed like the whole team were just brushing it under the carpet, but maybe that was for the best, if they constantly scrutinised everyone’s bad decisions then they’d never be able to get out of the castle long enough to save the universe.

Still, Lance was trying to forget it himself, and was avoiding Shiro as much as possible. There was still some tensions there, even some added ones caused by Lotor, but he was going to be the one to break the family up when things actually appeared to be getting better.

Lotor, the new Galran King, was actually on their side? Helping them restore the universe from Zarkons evil reign. Rescues and missions are going better than they ever did, everyone is bonding more with their lions. It was a good time to be a Paladin of Voltron. 

Things were better though, on the first layer, Allura and Shiro seemed to be getting on better. Well, they weren’t dating according to Allura during one of her and Lance’s weekly girls nights from a while back, but they were getting along better. It was sad to begin with, when Lance had returned from Histerion the two of them had been so full of love and hope for the future but it seemed that something had changed between the pair of them, what it was Allura frustratingly could not work out, but it was the one thing keeping the pair of them from fully reuniting again.

Still things were better.

Hunk was as private as always about his love life, but if it was smile was anything to go by, his talk with Shay had really helped to lift some of those anxieties that Hunk was holding down quite deeply. Which was nothing but a good thing to Lance. He didn’t want to see his friend worried about anything, and it was good that the two finally were able to address some unknowns in their relationship, even if being long distance was difficult.

Lance could fully agree with that himself. Sure, Keith had popped back once or two these last few months and they did speak every few days if the two weren’t busy with saving the universe so it wasn’t as bad as long as some others relationships. Lots had been going on with both of their lives, Keith finding his mother for one, that’s not exactly small. Lance was absolutely shitting fifty breaks a day about the time where he finally will have to meet this Krolia and explain his intentions with her son. Will he have to ask permission to continue dating him? Will he have to find a way to make her love him too or will she force Keith to dump Lance and find someone more suited to him?

He sure hoped not. Not that he’d ever run those concerns by Keith because even Lance knew that he was being… a little ridiculous and Earthen archaic with his views.

Still, that was probably a long way away and what use was worrying about the future when he could just pleasantly enjoy the present.

Which led Lance to today. Resting in his bed, a fun day ahead, with a lot to do before that. So, he starting by rising out of his bed like a queen. No blaring alarms, no shouting or screaming from outside his door. Just pure silence. He got up slowly, stretched himself out, did a bit of yoga, showered, and headed out of his room all before it even reached 9am and headed down towards the longue.

A new routine had formed in the castle, and Lance knew that every morning between 9 and 11 on the artificial Altean clock was when Hunk would sit in the longue, maybe nap from all the cooking he’d been doing since waking up at 6am, or playing with one of the Altean tablets that Allura had given him for “research purposes” when Lance really knew that Hunk would just play a game that faintly resembled the old Snake game on old Nokia phones from their childhood.

Hunk was a creature of habit, something Lance loved about him. 

So, he wasn’t surprised at all when he strolled into the longue and found Hunk exactly where he was expecting him, expect instead of on a tablet he was just resting his head on the back of the chair, slowly lifting it up when the doors closed behind Lance as he came in.

“What are you doing up?” Hunk snorted from the longue chair, spread eagle across in his paladin uniform. “You’d think with Allura allowing longer lay-ins now that you’d be taking advantage of them more.”

“Why sleep?” Lance breamed, throwing his arms up dramatically. “On a beautiful day like this?”

“Can’t really relate to that. Since we’re in space. It’s never day.” Hunk snorted but scooted over nonetheless so Lance could plonk himself down unceremoniously next to him.

“So,” Lance grinned, leaning into his best friend’s side. “What’s cooking, good looking?” 

“If you mean literally, then I’m making Space Carbonara for the meeting later, if you mean how am I, then I’m great.” Hunk smirked, leaning right on back into Lance. “You are in a very good mood today, what’s got you beaming? Heard from Keith today?”

“We spoke the other day.” Lance waved nonchalantly. “So one of us will probably call the other tomorrow. I might take a ride in Red in the morning and call him then.”

“You know, I find the fact that you two only talk when you’re in the Red lion very shifty. I’m never going in your lion unless you’ve deeply cleansed it first.” Hunk snorted, playing with the collar of his armour, shifting it into a move comfortable position.

Lance gawped. “Please. I’m not 17 anymore, I don’t need to throw one into the wind every single time he calls.” 

“You’re only 18 and I will never believe you.” Hunk snorted. “Plus, age doesn’t matter, I know way too much about you and your slutty habits.”

“And I know too much about you. Prude.” Lance humphed good naturedly. “My slutty habits do not need to be satiated as often as you seem to think.”

“Sure buddy.” Hunk snorted. “So are you ready for the meeting?”

“Talking to alien leaders who each have cultural beliefs and habits that I have no idea about and thus could potentially offend each and every one of them? I’m beaming with excitement.” Lance chuckled. “Yeah, I actually am. It’s going to be fun. I’ve heard that the Lunso people are big on dancing so it’ll be nice to let Dancey Lancey out of his cage for a day.”

“Dancey Lancey is never in his cage, and never should be.” Hunk smiled. “I knew that was what you were going to focus on when Allura announced the guests. Just don’t forget that the Brexitians find it rude to show off knees so don’t crack out your booty shorts.”

“The booty shorts have a big reserved sign on them for when Keith gets back so I wouldn’t be cracking them out even if they all found it a good thing.”

The two continued to talk for awhile, just idly chatting about life of the castle, possible future missions, new engineering projects that Hunk wanted to start working on but like most things, their conversation was cut short was a screeching shriek echoing across the castle.

“Lance Asshole McClain!”

Hunk turned to Lance with the widest smirk that Lance had ever seen. “Oh. You're in trouble.”

Said trouble came in the form of a tiny Green paladin bursting through the door, dressed in nothing but their bathrobe and a towel over their head, dripping as they stomped towards him. 

“This is the last time, McClain! Get your own phone!” The young girl screamed before yeeting her phone towards Lance's direction and stomping back out the room again just as fast as she had entered.

“What did I do?” Lance whimpered as he reached for the phone that had landed with a loud thump thankfully beside him against the couch rather than on him. 

“Lance?” A familiar voice called out as he picked up the phone. “Is that you?”

Lance could recognise that voice anywhere, that voice had been playing in his head for months, playing out all his best and dirtiest fantasies. 

“Oh! Hey babe!” Lance gasped in surprise. “I didn't know you were calling today!”

“That explains Pidge’s mood.” Hunk snorted from beside him. “I'll leave you two to it.”

Lance was only faintly aware of Hunk jumping to his feet and leaving the room as he set eyes on the best looking man on this planet (other than himself).

“Hey Lance.” Keith mumbled, looking to one side, his cheeks a faint shade of red. Even after a few months of long-distance dating, Keith was just as bad as when they started on the phone. “Sorry. I just found out I’m going on mission tomorrow so I thought I’d call first, and since you weren’t with Red I just called Pidge’s phone. Hope she doesn’t kill you.”

“It’s fine babe, she can try. How you doing, sexy?” Lance winked. “How’s everything with your mom?”

“Yeah. It’s good. Weird I guess.” Keith shrugged. “How’s everything back home?”

Lance smiled, he found it cute when Keith called the castle home. “It’s all good. Just more building good relations with some planet leaders today. They’ll probably start arriving in the next few vargas. I have been put on ‘general chitchat’ duty in order to allow our guests to feel more at ease and comfortable, thus more able to discuss more serious matters with the bosses.”

“Is that your official duty?” Keith snorted. 

Lance nodded dramatically. “Yep. Allura wrote it down on a piece of paper and everything. Very official.”

“It sounds it. Are you gonna be able to live up to a Princess’ demand?” 

“She can demand me to jump off a cliff and I would do a flip for her. I always give her above and beyond her expectations.”

“Don’t let her hear you say that. She might just make you.” Keith chuckled, relaxing now as the conversation got into a better flow. 

“The Lancenator will do anything for his princess.”

“Lancenator?”

“Uh huh!” Lance nodded, allowing a short high pitched giggle escape his throat. “It’s my new nickname.”

“Oh right.” Keith smirked. “And who calls you that?”

“Umm.” Lance rolled his eyes. “Me obviously.”

“No one else?”

“Not currently but we are getting there.”

“Okay. Lance.”

“Babe.” Lance whined. “Call me Lancenator, please!”

“I absolutely refuse and will hear no argument about it.”

“God.” Lance sighed, throwing his legs up onto the lounge couch. “You used to be fun, now you wear a purple skin tight suit that shows the perfect sculpt of your ass and think you’re the new Britney Spears.”

“I do not.”

“Sure you do, Britney.”

“My name is Keith. Don’t make Britney a thing, please.” Keith rolled his eyes but Lance could see Keith trying to hide his smile behind his hand.

“Okay but listen, you just reminded me, I’ve been meaning to run this by you for a while.” Lance grinned, balancing his phone on his legs as he laid down completely on the couch. “Your name sucks.”

“Noted.” Keith rolled his eyes dramatically. “Thanks for the update.”

“No, no, listen.” Lance couldn’t help but laugh. “Okay, your name sucks, you can’t be in the Blade of Marmora with a name like Keith.”

“Well… I have been for a while now.”

“Well you need something cool. Keith is a 40 year old divorced father who doesn’t pay child support’s name. Is that the type of person you are,  _ Keith _ ?” Lance hissed his boyfriends name as if it burnt on his tongue.

“As far as I know I’ve never fathered a child so no. But that’s my name, Lance, I can’t just change my name.”

“Sure you can. People do it all the time. It can just be your undercover supername, something cool to strike fear into the hearts of all galra.” 

“Like what?”

“I dunno. Anything with a Z, V or X in it will do.” Lance shrugged. “Like… Zorkid, or Vorx… Or Dexzon.”

“Those just sounds like sounds.” 

“Alright… They weren’t my best… How about…” Lance smirked. “Zexy.”

“That’s even worse.”

“Come on. My little Zexy boy in the blades. My zexy boyfriend. It’s perfect.”

Keith blushed and turned away from the phone. “You’re hopeless.”

“Hopelessly in love with you.”

Keith immediately spluttered, and in his surprise, his phone fell off his lap giving Lance a lovely view of his plain ceiling as his phone fell to the bed.

“Y-You can’t just say s-stuff like that.” Keith blundered as he picked up his phone and returned it to its previous position, his face as red as a tomato.

“Why not?”

“B-Because I said so.”

“Ooh?” Lance giggled. “Are you bossing me around now Keith? I thought that was strictly when we were alone  _ together _ . When you could really put that bossy tongue to good use.”

“Oh my god. Why am I dating you?”

“Because I’m great.

“Okay. Yes you are. You’re amazing, but seriously? How is everything lately? Is Lotor staying in his lane?” Keith raised a suspicious eyebrow “Are you?”

“Yes! I am! And well… Yeah. I’m okay. There’s some Shiro stuff going on I suppose, which you already know about. With that ceremony and everything. But I’d rather you were here to discuss that.”

“I promise I’ll come home at some point.” Keith tilted his head and sighed. “It’s just hard to get away.”

“I know. The universe doesn’t care about our teenage melodrama.” Lance chuckled somewhat sadly. “It’s fine. I know you’ll be back so I’m not worried, as long as you’re safe, it’ll take as long as it takes.”

“It’s just hard when I come back.” Keith sighed. “Because it’ll mean I’ll have to just leave you again.”

“Aww.” Lance gawped in surprise of Keith’s words. “That’s really sweet, babe, did you read that somewhere?”

Keith flushed red again, immediately giving himself away. “No!”

“It’ll be okay babe. We have time. I can wait a little longer before I can have you in my arms on a 24/7 basis. You’ve still gotta meet the ‘rents too. I’ll give you time to decide if you like me first before you gotta decide if you like them.”

“I already know that I like all of you. A lot.”

“Well thanks. We like you too.” Lance smiled. “When you come back be aware, you’re not leaving my bedroom for at least 24 hours, I don’t care if you’ve even greeted everyone. Just tell them you’re coming the next day so you can sneak in they don’t disturb us.”

“Lance, that’s called not being very nice.”

“No. It’s called I miss my boyfriend and the first thing I do when I next see him is ride him into the next galaxy.”

“You are a mess.”

“Besides, by the time you get here we’ll probably have adopted a few new temporary residents. Allura uses this castle like a hotel now. Dinner’s are always a packed event, which makes Hunk obviously happy. Pidge not so much.”

“Save me a seat. With all the allies you’ve all been making lately who knows if they’ll even be space for me at the table anymore.” Keith snorted. 

“Come on babe, as long as I have a face, you’ll always have a place to sit.”

“I think we should see other people. Goodbye Lance.”

“Keith! Wait!”

Keith blew one final smirking kiss before exiting the call and for the first time in a long time, Lance didn’t feel any sadness at all. Sure he missed his boyfriend but he wouldn’t have to wait too long.

Eventually, they both will be able to come home. 


End file.
